The Aniweda Dream Realized

Everglades West Lake Trail (Photo credit: Guillaume Capron)

When I started this blog(almost exactly 3 years ago back in 2010), I was reminiscing on the taste of The Aniweda Dream I’d had months earlier.  It had been almost a year later, but I knew I had never felt more alive and that this dream was forever, a part of me.  I dreamed of experiencing it again.

 

What I didn’t anticipate was how thoroughly I would need to come to grips with the dreams I was already living.  The conflicting dreams.  I have taken a long hiatus from this blog on more than one occasion.  It happens when I realize the things I have to write about, need to be fixed, that I can’t sit around writing about them.

 

And so I did, twice…at least, and I am at the tail end of fixing this last huge dream that is in complete conflict of The Aniweda Dream.  What is The Aniweda Dream, you ask?  It’s a dream of sustainability, responsibility, living in communion with nature, spiritual awareness, living with purpose, community traditions etc.

 

I read about the word Aniweda in a Muskogee Creek language book.  It was synchronous though because I had been focusing almost entirely on intuitive development at that time and had been exploring my ancestral history through dreams and visions during that time.  I felt the knowledge of this term, though I couldn’t reconcile exactly what it was called in my mind.  I knew it ended and started the same way as America, and had the same number of syllables.  I knew it was a truer sense of “America” for me, and I wanted to reclaim it, at least for mysefl.

 

Then I found the word in this book.  This was all in a matter of days, I’d imagine(though it was years ago, I could be wrong).

 

Once I found this word, I meditated on it.  I felt a surge of energy emanating from having this connection within and without.  I felt a distinct difference in my comfort and communion with nature.  I “channeled” the most amazing spirit dance ever, at a lookout near the Fakahatchee Strand in South Florida during this time and had an amazing experience with a couple of dancing deer as well.

 

I am now going to South Carolina.  To a city I lived when my first daughter was born.  A city with parks and nature areas galore.  I’m going there to get grounded and feel community and realize where I am in The Aniweda Dream, perhaps that I am and life is The Aniweda Dream.

 

I’ll finally put my Aniweda Dream poetry/guidebook together.  I’ll finally record the episodes of The Aniweda Dream videos that I’ve been intending to do.  I will heal and my children will heal and grow and explore in ways we haven’t been able to, due to those things I couldn’t write about, until I changed them.

 

I’m just a few days from changing those things, so I’m still not ready to write about it.  But if anyone is still reading, please wish me luck, and I will feel connected to anyone else who is discovering, rediscovering, realizing or creating their own dream.

 

~~Still Dreaming

 

Are They Aniweda Dreaming?  Read and Find out!

• Nomad Dream: A Family Cycling & Climbing Around the World (mec.ca)
• And there were never any shackles. . . (kariwordsmith.wordpress.com)
• Broken Winged Buzzard Dreams Part lll (dannimcgriffith.wordpress.com)
• The Dr. Vibe Show: The Nomadness RV College Tour (thedrvibeshow.com)
• Global Nomads and Existential Migrants (tallskinnykiwi.typepad.com)
• The Nomadic Life: More Experiences, Fewer Things (blogher.com)
• The Purple Van Dream (thishumanjourney.com)

Wild and Ancient Fruit: Is it Really Small, Bitter, and Low in Sugar? Ms Gray speaks..

Reblogged from Durianrider's Blog:

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"Given the recent blog-o-drama about carbs in the human diet , this seems like a fine time to blog about a sweet subject dear to my heart: fruit! More specifically, I want to take a closer look at some common beliefs about wild fruit, and how it differs from the store-bought stuff most of us have access to.

For those looking at evolution for clues about the optimal human diet, fruit is often regarded with suspicion.

Read more… 4,091 more words

What a great read!

Organizing For The Road

I have a couple of stories to tell…bear with me.  They are related to condensing your life into what you need or what you can carry with you in a small space…

I have treated myself to this challenge numerous times.  Once it was everything I could fit in a backpack.  The next chance I had, I acquired a suitcase too!  I domesticated pretty well over the next few years and I had a car.  The next time I decided to travel I basically stuffed everything I could into the car.  There wasn’t much organization.

Organize (Photo credit: alborzshawn)

This was the deal for a years.  Living in a stationary home is an amazing way to acquire a lot of stuff.  I know there are people who are really good at minimalizing and keeping things simple and but in general unnecessary space wants to be filled…and it is pretty easy to do so.

When we moved into our first RV, there was too little space and it took too long to try to organize thing, it was an unending, never finished project.  It is not that the RV itself was too small, but it was not suited for having/storing things…that whole capacity to store things needed some serious restoration.  Our next RV was much better.

With this RV we now had a car we weren’t using(due to car crash).  At this time we actually had two RV’s and a car and I really got into organizing and getting our living space perfect.  I very slowly put things into the trailer we were living in. Throwing things away in the RV and the car.  It was a long process but it was a lot more fun this time because I really had a space I loved that was suited for organizing and living in.

Organized! (Photo credit: mgstanton)

The one thing that was difficult was all the stuff I wanted to get rid of, but didn’t want to throw away.  During that time, something like ebay would have gone a long way.  For some reason I didn’t think of that at all…but this time, as I’m organizing, purging and getting prepared to travel again, I have become an ebay seller.

You see, I live in a house with a chronic buyer of unneeded things, who stores those things everywhere, doesn’t know what she has, and never gets rid of anything.  I didn’t even think I had much to get rid of, since I have never lived in this place before.  But as I looked in my closet and the myriad of clear box containers, I realized though I last lived with this woman in another home, the things I left there traveled with her.

I have also been overwhelmed with the sheer amount of stuff that children can acquire.  I never need to buy my children clothing or anything that they don’t need.  Their grandparents, etc. take care of that.  If there is ever anything I don’t want my kids to have, I can count on someone buying it for them.

I have seen that my kids are a lot happier with simplicity, however.  I will not give away everything they own, but my daughter is totally with me, that she has too much stuff and wants to give a lot of it away.  I also have ideas of getting things for them that are more natural and more simple.  In my early parenthood I was able to keep things pretty simple, but I guess I caved, or stopped my brief stint of being confrontational.

I am excited to see what I end up with and how simplified I can become again.  I’m thinking 3 bags each would be good for myself and my girls.  One for papers, one for toys, one for clothes… there will be things that don’t fit in bags however, but let’s see how this goes.

Do you have a system for organizing, purging or simplifying?  How many pairs of shoes does one child need?  How many dresses?  I know there is a fine line between not having enough and having too much… I am trying to find that line again.  Am I too much of a minimalist?

Related articles

• I Live in an RV, but I’m Not a Redneck. Swears. (aiminglow.com)
• Smart Car & Camper Combined To Create Super Efficient RV (earthtechling.com)
• 2012 RV-Dreams Fall Rally Summary – (Harrisburg, OR) (rv-dreams-journal.com)
• Raising Minimalist Teenagers in an Age of Consumerism (zenhabits.net)

The Aniweda Dream is Going Live?

 

Dear readers I am so sorry I have been so negligent.  I have so much to share with you all, but I have had a serious lack in computer participation.  I know many of you are thinking “hey, you said you were going to write about bipolar, dreams, RV living, and other-topic-promised to dear readers”.  I really do intend on getting to this.

 

English: Volkswagon bug RV (Photo credit: Wikipedia) How could I not post this picture?!

 

 

 

In fact I have several unfinished drafts and perhaps a few that are finished except for the corresponding imagery.  You all know by now I am so bad at brevity.  I cannot just say, “hey guys, my computer hates me and I have too much going on to create these gigantic posts, so here is some coolness to tide you over”.  Some bloggers are great at tiny, little blog posts.  Just like some writers can create stories in just one paragraph.

 

 

 

I have always envied those types of writers.  However, that is not me.  I have to write something out as if it was a novel…then begin to condense and compartmentalize and edit it down for you all to read comfortably.

 

 

 

This habit of mine has changed my world from being a poet/creative writer, who does freelance writing on the side, to a blogger, who does freelance writing on the side, and always intends to get back to the poetry and stories waiting to be submitted somewhere.  For these reasons the Aniweda Dream is going live in more ways than one.  Live-action for one, as well as live chats and live-in-person.

 

 

 

I have also determined that I have at least one book waiting to be compiled in my dashboard and that will be coming to you all soon.  I promised to write about a particular topic and realized it just wants to be more than a blog post or even a series of posts.  So thank you all for continuing to read, despite my inactivity.  It has inspired me to keeping putting my stories together, and very soon, I’ll be sharing things I’ve wanted to share for a very long time.

 

 

 

As I clear things out of my drafts folder and put them into their rightful place, this blog will begin to look and feel a lot more like a dream.   And I’m going to make it official with a more appropriate domain name too.  So please stick around because I have really been working quite hard behind the scenes and I am near ready to really show off.

 

 

 

I have a question though, if you could help me out a bit.  I know I have been all over the place with this blog.  I started it when I was pregnant with my second daughter and got really into it talking about my health/nutrition experiences.  I’ve shared lots of different topics and explored many different looks, but this blog has always had a subtle purpose for me, and yet I am not sure how much I have touched on that for viewers to see.

 

 

 

If you could share with me what this blog represents to you…why do you read it?  What do you enjoy most about the posts?  What do you wish I’d write about more or less?  I know I have ventured and taken risks and made mistakes here, but I am now realizing how to reflect my intentions better with my writing and I’d love to hear back from you readers.

 

 

 

–Keep Dreaming