A Little Bit About Me ... (as recorded for a new friend)
Updated: Jul 16, 2022
Voice Memo Numero Uno
Virginia to Kes
sent January 2, 2021, 4:29 pm
recorded in Cody, Wyoming
received in Kispiox Valley, British Columbia
Whatsapp voice memo
10 minutes, 6 seconds in length
transcription:
“Hey Lady,
Happy New Year!
This is Virginia, Schmidt --- the one who reached out to you over email. So stoked you're down for this!
And before I forget, I just wanted to open this by saying two things:
First of all, I love the way you --- and I’ve never quite expressed it that way --- shared with the parenthesis around (he) and then art [in her first email, Kesia wrote (he)art], ‘cause, exactly!
When we’re sharing our art, we’re sharing our heart. And you probably already know this, but for some reason, somehow it was only a recent discovery for me: That, of course, the words heart and earth have the same letters! And that’s pretty powerful and pretty cool. Especially when you start getting into the vibrations of material building blocks, if you will. Like, the way letters build words. So that resonated with me.
That’s the other thing I was gonna say: I thought I was the only one who used phrases like “reciprocal resonance." So I felt ... I have goosebumps right now because of how much resonance I felt in reading your email.
So, it was, you know ...
When we’re sharing our hearts --- from that place of deepest authenticity that we all share in our hearts --- then we're able to clearly reflect the deepest and truest parts of each other’s heart’s back to the other, you know? Whether with people or with animals.
So, another way of saying that is: I felt I was seeing and feeling myself in reading your email.
Which is really just a testament to the inner work you’ve done to become clear, as far as I can see.
I can’t remember the exact line, or even which Rumi poem it is --- and probably multiple ones --- but, where he says what a Sufi is is really just someone who is a mirror."
*** the below is inserted from The Guardian at time of transcription/publication --- this stanza not included in voice memo***
[ "They give the Sufis pride of place in front
who like mirrors to the eye, reflect soul
Burnished by remembrance, contemplation,
their mirror-hearts receive pristine image …
Beauty's in love with its mirror image,
burnishing souls, instilling God in hearts." ]
"That is the highest place we can get in mastery in a lot of ways --- just having made our mirror so clear, you know … Healing our own traumas and our own shit and becoming more of the observer and becoming more neutral and becoming more part of our environment, I think, in that way. That’s the only way we can really begin to reflect what is ... without all that tarnishing, and without those scratches, and without all that is keeping us from seeing.
I really relate to that. I think about that, or I activate that in my relationships with animals a lot, as well, right? You can only really come into that communion from a place of clarity. And of course, we begin to get there by practicing presence and going into that which seems to be blocking us.
Yeah ... Obviously a lot to say about all those kinds of things.
Um, hello from my kitty who is sitting here on my ladder to my loft in my little tiny home cabin that I live in. Her full name is Lady May Lynn, and she is beautiful.
Lady May Lynn in the cabin.
***note: all photos included in these correspondences are photos Kesia and I sent to each other near time of correspondence.
And then I have Peter and Rozlyn with me here as well --- my two dogs.
Rozlyn aka Rozza aka Roz outside the Sunset Rim House
My brother Jack with Rozza and Peter in the Sunset Rim House, Christmas 2021
And … yeah, lots of horses here. My family has 25 horses, and then …
me on Stardust, Jack on Rawhide, Jack's then-fiance now-wife Liv on Rubio, on the BLM behind Sunset Rim House in Cody, Christmas 2021
I’m in the process of trying to create a whole new … I’m founding my own platform, finally. My own (He)art, my own Art, and it’s called divinity ranch.
It’s been a transition.
I lived in Guatemala for five months earlier this year, mostly with a host family. And it was during that time I started a youtube channel. That I basically started sharing my Heart ... started writing.
I’ve been a journalist and in content curation and media in various ways for many years. I’m 30, by the way. I was born and raised here in Cody, Wyoming, but I’ve lived quite a few other places in the meantime, and I’m back here again. Been led back to horses …
So while I was in Guatemala, I started a youtube channel, and at first I called it Divinity School. Which was supposed to be a little bit of a joke because my whole thing was, 'Oh, I can’t start sharing about my spirituality and sharing my heart in this way unless I go back to graduate school and go to, like, Harvard Divinity School…' and a woman who I was collaborating with at the time was just like, 'No, the point is, THIS is Divinity School. This is it.' But I’ve since changed it to divinity ranch.
My Mission Statement for divinity ranch is a community of healing.
Lately, I’ve really liked the word "facilitating." I love it because the definition of the word “facilitate” is to make easier. And of course, in Spanish, facíl [means "easy"], which I love.
So: Healing people, animals, and the Land in reciprocal ways. And I have a lot to say about that.
But yeah, I mean, you can find my youtube channel, it’s not … I mean, you’ve got to start somewhere. And I did. I just had to start.
And there’s so much more --- both in this physical place (my family’s land) and with our horses and animals --- as well as doing local community programs.
I’m really interested in incorporating --- what’s the word that I’m looking for? What is it? --- Ah! Chronos and Kairos: Finding Kairos within Chronos. You know, like the timeless, divine values we have: What does that actually look like here, in this time and place on Earth?
I think animals and the Land, and of course relationships, are the battleground, even, if you will, where we practice those things, moment to moment, and day by day.And so, that’s just a little bit about my vision for divinity ranch.
I do want it to be a retreat center, an events center, a filming location, a shooting location --- figuring out ways to be globally connected and to bring in funds in ways connected to larger sources of funding. Like, for instance, through connections having our horses be used for filming … And maybe you’ve thought of this kind of stuff before, too, which I think is really important as far as the narrative that gets shown for the way people connect with animals.
It’s like you watch horse movies sometimes, and you’re like, 'Wow, they just kind of got whoever and clearly there’s no connection going on there,' you know?
So doing things like [making movies with real horse relationships] could bring in a big source of revenue to then not have to be trying to make money with the community programs I envision implementing. [Programs] like horse yoga, which has so many implications and various forms. I’m sure you've thought about or do stuff [related] to [those kinds of ideas], I don’t know --- things like stewardship and horsemanship or horsewomanship ... horse relationship.
I’m so interested to have this relationship with you because I know I was drawn to you at the perfect time. And I’m just excited to hear about your paradigm, and what you’re doing, and your conceptions of the world, and how this all fits in for you.
You will probably open my eyes to a lot of, like, insidious things.
I grew up around horses, you know. This Land --- Double Doc Ranch, it’s called --- we have an indoor arena, outdoor arena; I mean it’s a perfect venue for a healing center. Both my parents were physicians, which is why it's called Double Doc. They’re retired now.
But it’s been ... the way the horse culture and a lot of things have been run here is a lot more of that kind of redneck, cowboy, not always, but there is a huge consciousness and energy of that here, and it’s sometimes been ... um… toxic?