Well I'm still at it.  Here is my update:

Health:  Since my last update back in April, I've rediscovered that Health is Everything. I invested some $$$ in a diet class that lasted 6 weeks and has me now eating a lot of coconut oil, macadamia nuts, and raw cream. It's the Keto geneic adaptation diet. I did this to releive myself of some nasty back and hip pain I'd been having since some low lunges I tried to impress my sister with on her last visit.....at that same time I got an xray for the hip problem and they discovered a little suspicious activity in the form of a possible but unlikely tumor....which led to a CT scan..and much handwringing while my body, moods, and mind adapted to fat (versus carbs) as its food source...and ultimately to a ALL IS PROBABLY WELL verdict form the orthopedic surgeon.  The good news is that the diet had worked. I feel better and I'm thinking better (I think) and I've been swimming regularly. All this, has everything to do with my Finance Makeover. I know is all connected, literally in my cells, just as the health of our earth is connected to the economic life of the human beings that live here.

Self-education Update:  I've continued the journey of discovery of alternate economic systems. Copiosis has been making huge strides. 

(You can visit Copiosis.com or chat on facebook at Copiosis Social Group).

We (I say we now and  not they) are starting a demonstration project in a Portland neighborhood (Kenton) as a proof of concept.  

My work with Copiosis, and discovering more and more people who believe that the time for a moneyless and governmentless society is truly upon us, is energizing. It's hard to believe I even think it is possible but frankly it does not feel hopelessly idealistic. On the contrary, it feels very clearly pragmatic and an obvious solution to problem after problem after problem.  Here are just a few other groups working along the same lines.

Ubuntu (Mike Tellinger)
Zietgiest Movement (an ecclectic group)
The Venus Project (Jacques Fresco)
The Moneyless Soceity . com
Parelco

Change Banks: I am almost ready to close my Wells Fargo bank accounts. Except for the credit card which I find very hard to let go of because of the handy credit limit and luring perk of "free" airfares periodically.  

Improve Garden:  Most of my hardy plants are still alive. I'm watering the garden way less because of the drought, including the front yard for all to see and admire (Oh, they say, that lady must be drought friendly i can tell by the unwashed condition of her car and the sad looking lawn).  I invested in another gardening book with the idea of growing my own food (have had that idea before and have grown a lot of random vegetables that get eaten by bugs and dug up by my dogs). Mostly I am humbled. I have very little time to devote to this project and so (sigh), I accept and admire my lackluster efforts mostly so far. At least I no longer have to look at a lush lawn and feel guilty about it.

Continue to Revise Stock Portfolio: Not much progress on this one yet. Its time is coming. 

More $$$ news:  I'm investing in Mom-care.  Meals on wheels for her 3x a week (3 lunches I don't need to make) plus respite care 2 evenings a week with wonderful young Philipina woman who makes us smile and relax. Knowing that she came to the U.S. to a marry a much older man who she looks after and who llooks after her....and allows her to support her family back home....humbles me yet again. the everyday things that make me whine are so little compared to what others have faced and are facing...I just can't think about it to much or it sucks the energy for moving forward right out of me. I am where I am because I am. And I am glad to be here.

Also, as of last Saturday, I am back creating Nurtured Heart Community here in Chico (July 26th blog post) and feel in delicious alignment to offer it freely and wholeheartedly.

Yahoo!

FOR PARENTS and others with or without NHA experience

Nurtured Heart Approach® Parent Support & Energizing Circle

WHEN: Four Saturday evenings starting July 26, 2014

·         July 26, Aug 2, Aug 9, Aug 16

·         6 to 7:30 pm  - Stay after for potluck meal – Childcare possible…

WHERE: Call for location

There were seven of us at my house on Saturday evening, July 26th,  6-7:30pm (three more Saturdays to go for this 4-part NHA Parent Support and Energizing Circle session and YOU ARE INVITED) to discuss the Nurtured Heart Approach. In the first session we talked about ENERGY and INNER WEALTH which is what this approach is all about. I was reminded how much I need to do this in a community in order to keep it thriving in me. 

Thanks to Saturday night, on Sunday I had the energy needed to figure out elder care for my mother (thank you to one of my closet friends) and then to take my daughter and a friend of hers up into Butte Creek Canyon where another treasured friend (who loves to talk NHA with me) took us on a hike and a series of swims which eventually led to a huge pod of salmon. 

My point is that I HAD THE ENERGY to do all of that.  Seeing those fish, after their long journey from the ocean, getting ready to spawn, and then to die sometime in the fall when their time is up….wow, talk about energy….those fish have it, along with persistence naturalness, beauty, willingness to live in community, and a fierce spirit of independence. 

This coming Saturday, August 2nd, the discussion will be STAND ONE, Absolutely NO to Negativity!  

No experience necessary. Please RSVP if you can make it.

PRICE: Incalcuable and  FREE*

*I know in the first flyer, if you saw that one, I laid out some suggested prices and gave the opportunity for trading (as well as simpl attendance with your presence).  However, I have decided not to accept money after all for these meetings and to let go of any attempt to orchestrate anything. I will take advantage of your attention now, though, and promote my interest in a MONEYLESS SOCIETY….If you are interested you can visit COPIOSIS SOCIAL GROUP on Facebook….or Copiosis.com for information….and another moneyless paradigm I recently came across is UBUNTU (Michael Tellinger). I’m sure there are many others cropping up around our world as I write. I’m so grateful to have the Nurtured Heart Approach which although it has nothing directly to do with a moneyless society, it has everything to do with the giving of our gifts, the growing of our collective inner wealth, and allowance for the natural transfer of mental health and loving energy from one generation to the next. With gratitude, Erica


RSVP: 530-520-9239 or [email protected]

Making over my finances is much harder than I anticipated. Which is a great lesson in and of itself. Here are my updates:

Change banks:  Now instead of having 6 accounts at Well Fargo, I have 6 accounts at Wells, plus 5 at Umpqua, plus 1 at Golden Credit Union. Sheesh. I've put in the auto deposit requests from Mom's social security and pension income and we're waiting for the swtich to work so then I can change all the auto withdrawls for bills. This is a 60 - 90 day process especially if you include some space for a crisis or two. Goal for completion - May 15th.

Improve Garden: This became part of my makeover during that painful part of the CA drought when there was no rain and it felt so urgent, like I might need to save the water for drinking.  I bought some native plants from a local nursery, planted them and also decreased my lawn space. Also had a consultation by a landscaper for $35, adding to her local economy. AND, then I hurt my back. So now I've been diverted to back/hip improvements, adding more to the local chiropractic and acupuncturist economies.

Revise stock portfolio: I did make some decisions (whoohoo) and for now I'm satisfied with my stock choices (no more Walmart, Macdonalds, Oil Companies, or Boeing), and added some "socially responsible" mutual funds. But I know I really haven't touched the changes I feel are necessary to walk my talk. I'm just still walking to discover what the talk really is. Still looking into Slow Money. 

Self-education update: On Friday I'm attending a SKYPE session with the founder of COPIOSIS, which is a very interesting innovation in socio-economic organization. Essentially it describes in easy to fathom details a Utopian Anarchy. I have just the right astrological makeup to believe that this kind of stuff is worth my time and energy even if I never live to see its fruition.

More $$$ Decisions: I decided not to attend an expensive but well-worth-the-price and local workshop which would most definitely enhance my future. Why? Because Mom needs me is why. Her heart is beating erratically, she is out of breath more all the time, she can't remember if she's awake or what day it is, and she gets sweeter and sweeter everyday and she doesn't want me to go. The cost of getting care for her, plus dogs, plus all the arrangements is simply exhausting and prohibitive. So instead I will improve my future by more fully engaging in My Finance Makeover and in other career related projects which have begun to satisfy me immeasurably already. So all is quite well.  

I was in the tiny school kitchen putting away dishes after a fundraiser when she walked in dressed in heels, made up, with jewelry on, carrying one child in a carrier, under her arm a 3-ply board like the kind you see at a science fair, and motioning to her daughter and an older son to move on into the hallway.

“We’re trying to do this nurtured heart thing, so we are late  because of him. “ She said stressed and pissed to the office lady who happens to be my neighbor too.

“At least we are here, but we are late, and we better not be late again.  I told him so…” The little boy’s head was hanging now.

He was wearing a bright green t-shirt and I could see the word “Science Fair Winner” on it. I cringed internally. How dare she claimed to do the nurtured heart.

She went back out to her car and I went to him and told him that I noticed his green shirt with the words winner on it, and I noticed how all three were standing together so unified, like a tribe, all the while Mom was gone.  (i was feeling happy and smug.)

She returned. I told her, “I think you may have a scientist on your hands.” He went bounding out now to his class and she smiled quickly and left with the other two.

I went to my office lady neighbor friend (this is a small town), and whispered. “Geez. I felt so bad for the kid….” And she said “Yeah, I think she missed something in the training.” And we laughed a little nervously together.

And then I did what I tell people not to do. I gossiped.  My eyes kind of wide and imploring her to listen to my story, I said:  “So last night I was at this NHA event and this teacher I know said she had some parents who were also there but they really didn’t know how to do ‘nurtured heart’…

“Maybe they are trying to make some changes?” I said.

“No, they aren’t doing it!” she insisted and rolled the eyes.

“Well, everyone has to start somewhere, you know?”  ….

“No, they really aren’t doing it!” she doubly insisted this time with an in breath.

And so I just had to tell office lady neighbor friend that this teacher just didn’t get it.  I had to roll my eyes at the memory of her.  And then there I stood a moment, so obviously stuck in my own not having gotten it.  

In breath for me.

I had more cups to put away, and a quick errand to run across the hall. I went on my way and saw the mom with the three kids. I stopped her I let her have it. 

“Hey, you have three kids huh?”

“Yeah”

“Wow, and you have time to get yourself pulled together. Look at you, your hair is even curled, and you have that nice jewelry on” (she’s younger than me, I feel I can pour this on safely). She starts to smile.

“And you had time to make a 3-ply board for the science fair?” Then I shut up.

Then she beamed and said something I didn’t hear cause I was immersed in my own happiness that had I shifted my energy from whanwhanwhan to zippitydodahzippityyay. 

I went back to the office and asked my friend if I could do a redo, to which she immediately said “yes of course” and then gave me her undivided attention.

“So I was at this NHA event last night and a teacher came up to me and she was discouraged and I didn’t have the right words to say."  In breath. "But next time maybe I wil!.”

My friend beamed at me with her approval, my heart opened.   And we back on to our days. 

It was a gorgeous summer day, I was in my back yard talking to a therapist from Houston, choking back some tears. Should I go to this NHA intensive training? Could I afford it? Could I find somebody to take care of my mother? What about the children? Was it responsible to spend that kind of money? What was I doing with my life?

And then it hit me that I had to sign up for this five day training thing for no other reason than to nurture my own heart. I had to do it for me.

When I got there I think I was one of two women and one grandmother who were “just” parents. Most everyone else had a professional connection to this work. It was a transformative week. The fact that I knew this was going to benefit my children and our relationship was at this point merely a plus.

I found NHA about 8 months prior. I had wanted to present a whole different set of parenting techniques to parents at my childrens’ school, a set of techniques that had gotten me out of some deep dark woods (ie, fights, threats, meltdowns, and showdowns) and into a more stable disciplined environment. The only trouble now was that we (my son, my daughter, and I) basically hated each other. So when the principal suggested I listen to some tapes by Howard Glasser based on his book, “Transforming the Difficult Child” I did.  

Now, over more than two years, I’ve immersed myself in this work either as a parent or a coach to other parents -- sometimes just fitting it in amidst my responsibilities as a caregiver and a bookkeeper, sometimes devoting hours to it in a volunteer capacity, but always applying it to my life because it is about so much more than transforming a difficult child, although it needs not be anything more than that to be fantastic, and it is. (Believe me, I know from years of experience that nothing can be sweeter than transforming a difficult child if he or she happens to be yours….except taking that transformation and applying it right to your own self. That is equally sweet.)

Feb. 20th 2014 ANNOUNCEMENT:


Hi! So. This website is about to change. I love this website, but I have been changing so now I need to change it. In the meantime, here are three important announcements: One, if you live in Chico, CA, Blue Oak School is having a FREE Nurtured Heart Series beginning February 27th, 2014 at 6pm. Two, please SAVE THE DATE because, the wise and wonderous Howard Glasser, founder of the Nurtured Heart Approach is coming to Chico APRIL 9th, 2014 to share some inspiration. I'll write more when I know more. IT'S GOING TO BE GREAT TO WELCOME HIM HERE TO CHICO.

Three, I've started a finance makeover, with a new facebook page called, uh,  MY FINANCE MAKEOVER.  I'll be writing every day about my progress toward transitioning my finances: from a big bank to a local bank; from a big bank's credit card to a socially conscious credit card (the credit card itself will not be conscious ); from a typical stock market plus bonds investment "strategy" to a new purpose altogether for the money my brother left me when he died (thank you www.slowmoney.org); from a water-sucking non-drought friendly landscape to fruit trees, raised garden beds and feeding the soil around the land on which my house sits. (Land and Money are connected.) 

Well, thank you so much for your  individual and collective passion, widsom, integrity, intelligence, fortitude, and resilience. You nurture me. 


END OF Feb. 20th, 2014 ANNOUNCEMENT

Let’s be clear, more than a few days have passed between Day Six and Seven. A kind of time warp, a white hole that sucked in a bunch of other seemingly non-related events. This day is a Sunday, March 9th, 2014 and the central lesson to myself is: Do one thing at time. Do it with your whole attention.

People have been asking me (by people I mean my mother), “Why are you changing banks?” I say something like “big banks bad, small banks better.” And she nods. Ah. And we go on, until she asks me again, having forgotten my clear and descriptive answer. 

This morning I have a new answer. It’s not my own. It’s a collective answer from my gut, that place within that is connected to everything that came before me and everything that will come after me (theplaceoffoodmeetspoop).

I’m changing banks because: 1) I feel better believing that I could in theory at least meet the owner(s) of a bank versus 2) I feel crappy thinking  that there are too many of them to know (shareholders), all of whom have no personal direct responsibilty to me nevermind the slightest interest in actually meeting me.

There are too many people who owning/buying/selling tiny portions of those big banks for me to comprehend. (And as a matter of fact, I'm one of the them who doesn't want to meet me.) It's all too confusing. (See Finance Makeover To Do List: Sell  your Wells Fargo Stock)

Have you ever fantasized about winning a million dollars? It’s just at that amount of money that I can imagine “owning” and doing something with it that makes me feel a little (ok a lot) of pleasure. But a billion dollars? I slip off into worry and fear when I consider a billion dollars. What would I do with it, would I be plagued with worry and concern that I wasn’t doing enough good or the wrong good? How many people would try to get some of it from me, how many closets of neatly pressed Gap clothing would I have to clean?  A million feels very good. A billion? No so much. I guess that’s just my small imagination.

Pause.

Here is a paraphrase by Charles Eisenstein, a self-proclaimed ordinary man: ‘Why does it hurt when we hear about the last rainforests being destroyed? When we listen to the news on Syria or Ukraine or ___(fill in the blank)_________. Why does it hurt when we hear that the last blue bellied angel frog died last night on a lonely road in Kansas? WHY? Because WE ARE the last rainforest, the Syrians, the Ukrainians, and the frogs.’

So that’s why I’m changing banks and making over my financial habits. I feel in my gut that the I am is connected to the You are and the WE ARE. And denial hurts.



On my It's-all-connected-finance makeover-to-do-list for this week:

Sell your Wells-Fargo stock.

Take Mom to hospital to have heart shocked with paddles to put her in better heart rhythm.

Change appt time for planting-CA native-plants consultation.

Don’t forget about enjoying the expensive makeup from the rainforest you bought on the mall trip that was recommended by Dr Oz. (Wear it!).

When eating or drinking (including snacking and grazing), sit down and do only that. 

Part I

I took my mother to the bank today to give them her signature for our new joint account. It will really be her account, but I will manage it with all the monies deposited there, which go to support her, me and my two children. Our income comes from her social security, her teacher’s pension and when we need more than that from a brokerage account.  (And some income of my own which provides a few extras) She asks “Why are we doing this? Why are we changing banks?” Three or four times because she can’t retain the information. Why am I doing this? I re-ask myself. Is it worth it? This is hard, sitting here with the cute bank officer young enough to be my son. Well that part isn’t hard except that Im yawing and trying to stay awake, let alone focused on goal.

I am taking these steps to help pave the path that others haven taken and more will take after me. We have to come up with a new way to relate to each other economically, some way that does not finally in the end so damage our life support systems that we destroy the possibilities for our continued life, and that of the species that are left, here on Planet Earth.

That’s why. AND I’m doing it-- thanks to my perseverance and the following of my intuition over many years – because I believe that this is a path I must take.

Part II

I listened to some Abraham-Hicks today. I won’t go into why they bug me. Cause the parts that are important are way more important than the parts that bug me. And here it is. I can see I need to envision the better world my heart knows is possible to borrow a phrase from my hero Charles Eisenstein (http://charleseisenstein.net/project/the-more-beautiful-world-our-hearts-know-is-possible/)

So here goes: I know in my heart, that the possibility that humans live on this earth peaceably and where everyone has enough to eat and a decent environment to live in and with freedom exists. And I believe that there are technologies (and by that I mean inventions yet to come) which will make us understand why we’ve had to take this crazy journey here to the brink and stare collectively into the abyss.

It’s clear that we humans are causing the conditions which are causing this mass extinction, global warming, yah yah yah. And there is a big picture we are not privy too but that we are every last bit a part off. A-H says, think it, want it, desire it, know that it is done. So that is my task here, to see what’s possible, to dream it, and to trust.

My finance makeover, that’s all part it. It’s the part of the big picture being played through me. And it’s my honor and joy to play my role. Plus this makeover, it’s just kind. Putting money in places unconsciously, not knowing what it is doing? That is unkind, reckless and creates outcomes that I do not intend. These efforts remind me that I have compassion for all living beings. And compassion is true nature -- yours, mine and ours.

In 2002 I purchased 1008 shares of gold mining stock in Tanzania (and other places long forgotten) along with what was then worth about 20,000 dollars in physical gold. This was on the advice of a then fellow Sai baba devotee. The CEO of the Tanzanian stock company along with at the time Issac Tigrit of the House of Rock had both had interviews with Sai. Those details are to show just how my mind was influenced by the lure of wealth celebrity. And no doubt still is in parts more carefully hidden from the rest of me. Bow. Bow. Bow.

A couple weeks ago I finally sold what was left of the Tanzanian stock (about $1800, the rest including the physical gold is long gone) and yesterday I directed etrade to direct deposit the check in my soon to close Wells Fargo account….where I will transfer it shortly to my new account at Umpqua bank.

I’m free of that “investment.” That particular contribution of mine toward degrading Mother Earth is now complete. This little bit of self is no longer caught up in that particular web. She is liberated and now prays that those 1800 so called dollars find their way to an endeavor that nurtures and protects this gorgeous little blue dot in existing in space where we are living together.

Today I unloaded the car and brought the banking file into the garage.

Today I listened to more of Marco Vangelisti explain the Federal Reserve.

Today I talked to my friend and tried my best to explain some of these concepts.

Today I added a photos to my Finance Makeover page and worked on my description and thought about my purpose.

Today I wanted to get more done, but sometimes making a soufflé to please one’s mother, taking a son and his friend to the movies, and having tea with my sweetheart is most important.

Today was a Sunday.