Copyright 2009
These poems are about the healing of my cultural conditioning. My personal healing is in a book yet to come ?the poetry has been my savior and one of my main tools for healing. This is the gift Amy gave to me. Five years after her death, the kibbutz sent me to an enrichment course while working in the kinder garden. One of the courses was creative writing. The teacher was mourning her son as was I mourning Amy?this opened the channel which has been my medicine and healing. Today as I look back I am so grateful to Amy, who I have no doubt was an angel who?s earth mission was to wake me up.
Then going to a workshop on ?suffering? that same year? hoping to heal my pain and finding myself in Nablus, a town in the West Bank during the first Intifada. There I was exposed to the suffering of ?the other? for the first time. This was a great shock to me. I felt as if all my life I had known what to believe, who to hate, how to justify myself and my people and suddenly something broke. It almost felt as if my whole life I had been standing on a strong piece of glass and that day someone took a hammer and smashed it. It took me many years to gather the pieces, look at them ? one by one, cry about them, heal them and find my path to peace?,
On my path of healing I met many wonderful spiritual teachers and was led to many places for my healing and laying down the foundation of what I do today.
After Amy?s death and Tommy?s illness, my wasband, was given the position of being a base commander in the Northern Galilee. Here Jews and Arabs habitat the land . While living in the centre of the country, I had no contact at all with Arabs.
We moved to a kibbutz where I met Shanti in 1988. She was the first living angel that God put on my path?many followed?..
Nancy Reztlaff ? she and Shanti taught me Reiki in 1991.
I personally met the Dalai Lama in 1994 here in Israel at the small local airport. We left the Kibbutz in 1998 moved to Rosh Pina. They say that when the pupil is ready ? the teacher appears- well many appeared . Michael Lightweaver from Ashville, NC, James Twynman, a famous peace troubadour from Ashland.. Rabbi Shefa Gold from New Mexico, reconnected me with my Jewish spiritual roots which opened the door of reconciliation with my father.
Louise Diamond who did the first Jewish Arab workshop in my home.
With her were three wonderful woman from Hawaii including a wonderful Kahuna ? Auntie Pow Pow.
Devra West from Montana.
Dawn Ferguson also from Hawaii who brought the Dream Weaver and ?Children Singing Peace? into my life.
Jeanne White Eagle and John Pherson ? with them For The One Dance and all of my North Carolina and international spiritual family.
Jalaja Bonheim ? Circle , Lea Green ? Compassionate Listening,
Leon Burg and Ronit Rinat ? Council Cirlces and many more ?.
Hagit Raanan and Marsha Kreisler, holding my hand along the way.
In 1997 one of the major people in my transformation appeared ?
Rachel Kaufman. I had resisted taking part in her workshop ? I was overdosed on workshops but the minute I set eyes on her I knew this would be a special relationship. I often find myself looking in the direction of the sky asking who is pulling the strings. I spent three days with Rachel ? had two private sessions with her and participated in a workshop. At the end of the second session she turned to me and said she was on her way to Germany to do a month long training and would like me to join.
?My first reaction was ?You?ve got to be kidding. I will never put a foot in Germany. Never!.? But then the magic started happening and I realized I was being called. It all just fell into place and I knew I must say yes. Just the day before my daughter and I planned a vacation to Holland. The date of the workshop was right at the end of our vacation. I would be right there- a train ride away?
Well many things have happened since then?I have since been to Germany twice ? dancing with my dance family ? For The One Dance and had a lot of deep healing around the Holocaust. I have also visited Birkenau and Auschwitz with a group of spiritual people?.and still the fear of annihilation is present?I returned to South Africa to dance a few times ? once taking 4 girls from Creativity for Peace to the international youth dance?
In 1999 I visited Rachel in Santa Fe. She has a wonderful retreat center called Deva. Here I had a deep spiritual experience with Sarah and Hagar ? the mothers of Judaism and Islam. It started with them having a fist fight in my body and me crying how sick and tired I was of them fighting within me. Eventually they came together in my womb for reconciliation and forgiveness. Who would have thought then that in 2003 ? the children of these ancestral woman would be in this same space, in Devaland, as I call it, Israeli and Palestinian teenage girls coming together for reconciliation. The first few years Rachel facilitated the work. Now Silvia, my Palestinian friend and I facilitating their healing and peacemaking with the support of our American staff, board and volunteers.
Things were really looking pretty good in 1999. I was more involved, going to peace gatherings, visited Gaza, but still sitting on the fence and not really active.