rewilding #60 all the colors

I spent much of the day with two delightful males who are comfortable with all the colors. We discussed flower essences, fluidity in the body, the beauty of language…

I feel strongly that as women, we must nurture the creative, juicy, '"poetry” in our male counterparts. And then in turn, they must hold space for our power and strength. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: so many colors—my car’s view of the sunset, SLC

rewilding #59 homebase

This year my nervous system has been revving up into yellow & red levels.

Practicing yoga has offered my nervous system a homebase that is much lower in spikes than my homebase before practicing yoga. Having said that, I am very aware of my own levels of spiky-ness these days. What has helped me here in Salt Lake is to walk slower and do less. I haven’t even gotten on my bike! Working on homebase on so many levels. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: Ensign Peak, a homebase in SLC

rewilding #58 collective grief

The collective grief is palpable and heavy. 

After receiving many messages wrought with anger, confusion, and sadness; I met these with mantra, meditation, and movement. Not to bypass emotions, but to meet them as friends on the path. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: illuminating path of leaves, SLC

rewilding #57 golden hour

The last few days I have been trying on not wearing sun glasses.

Especially to receive morning sun directly into the eyes. I’m wondering if I’ve been hiding, and it has been an interesting practice to connect with others I pass without them. Sadly, most other people are wearing sun glasses, but at least they can see my eyes smiling at them. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: golden hour, SLC

rewilding #56 reflection

First of all, I am amazed at all of the gorgeous flowers still in bloom here. 

Flower gazing inspired me to ponder why we like what we like. Why am I attracted to certain flowers?—roses, for instance. I believe it is because our likes are a reflection of how we see ourselves. Roses can be thorny, deliciously fragrant, full of passion, and ever affectionate. A reminder of the importance of surrounding ourselves with others who reflect beauty and inspiration.

xoxo amrutaa
photo: white rose, SLC

rewilding #55 starting small

Even in this blog, I’ve restarted again and again. Starting over feels equal parts overwhelming and exhilarating. The questions of ‘who am I’ and ‘what do I really want’ aren’t new ones, but in my current situation feels like someone (me) is continuously screaming them in my face. Other words that keep surfacing are courage, grace, abundance, and starting small. In my experience, being big and doing big things are often masks for wounds and/or trying to fill the unfillable void. I have fallen into this ‘bigger is better’ trap my entire adult life, and this feels like a grand opportunity to lean into smaller joys and microadventures. 

For instance, discussing rocks with 2 young boys; having a dance party with these boys/mom; taking a 2 hour walk surrounded by fall colors, mountains, and infinite possibilities. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: afternoon walk in SLC, Utah

rewilding #54 shifts & changes

For most of October there were unseasonably high temperatures in Kansas (upper 80s) until the day I began the journey west. This offered an absolutely glorious combination of warmth + trees raining red & gold leaves. My last few days in Kansas couldn’t have been more precious, and I am carrying those beautiful moments into the shifts & changes ahead.

“Live quietly in the moment and see the beauty of all before you. The future will take care of itself.”
-Paramahansa Yogananda

xoxo amrutaa
photo: 2 day car sitting, Kansas - Colorado - snowy Wyoming (it was 29 degrees!) - Utah

rewilding #53 gratitude

Nothing but gratitude for the beautiful home Kansas has offered me. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: Clinton Lake, oh so dark & stormy

rewilding #52 we are one

Tonight as I enjoyed a walk down “Mass” St, I made a pact with myself to fall in love with Kansas in every moment tomorrow. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: downtown, Lawrence KS

rewilding #51 hot mess

Forever grateful to a friend for holding me through a day of tears and fears. Leaving Kansas on Halloween seems appropriate—a death of so much I’ve known for such a giant chunk of this life. It is okay to be a hot mess, and even more okay when there is someone there to wrap their arms around such a hot mess. 

”A death-blow is a life-blow to some”

A death-blow is a life-blow to some
Who, till they died, did not alive become;
Who, had they lived, had died, but when
They died, vitality begun. 

-Emily Dickinson

xoxo amrutaa
photo: an evening of death poems

rewilding #50 shedding stories

Snakes who shed their skins know the truth of ancient mysteries. Belly to dust. Skin to soil. Soil to soul. We turn and churn and are woven for remembering, a vessel for transformation, a song of becoming. Each season a seasoning. An entering. A kind of mating call to listen to the Beloved. Within and beyond. To the sacred keeper of time. To the divine intelligence. To the Divine. We shed stories like snakes shedding skins. We court shadows. We court the light. In fall, the letting go. But also the striving for the light. Holding stars in our eyes—in our hearts. We believe more than the stories they tell us. We are the new stories growing new skins content simply to exist, to be intensely, and absolutely there. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: looking up at this gorgeous tree, learning a new Lakshmi mantra, listening for the Beloved

rewilding #49 ceremony

The power of ceremony is that it marries the mundane to the sacred. Morning coffee as a prayer where the material and the spiritual mingle like grounds mingled with humus, transformed like steam rising from a mug into the morning mist. What else can you offer the earth, which has everything? What else can you give but something of yourself? A homemade ceremony, a ceremony that makes a home.

-Braiding Sweetgrass, Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teaching of Plants


Rewilding is a form of ceremony, a sacred ritual, a form of remembrance.

xoxo amrutaa
photo: sunrise at the wetlands

rewilding #48 renewal

This process of rebirth within life—renewed across seasons, across weeks, days, and between each moment. We wake up to a new day with nothing but opportunity to help pull us forward—we are renewed in the morning sun. We can begin a path entirely ours, entirely new. Between each breath we are renewed. Each moment is our opportunity to wash ourselves in the freshness of the here and now. Soak our eyes in the light, our feet in the soil; care for our breath, care for the moment, and feel how it takes care of us. We can be free, but we must be still and quiet so we can hear the silent roar of opportunity hiding behind every sound. 

I won’t let us forget. This is our song, our potential.

xoxo amrutaa
photo: Sanders Mound, Lawrence

rewilding #47 nonnegotiable

Being outside every day (for as long as possible) is a nonnegotiable.

xoxo amrutaa
photo: biking the levee trail at sunset under the watchful eye of many curious creatures

rewilding #46 being with purpose

A wonderful conversation about being vs doing and purpose vs no purpose swirled around after dinner last night. We often get stuck in the worldly model of “what are we doing” vs “how are we being” with no meaning/purpose needed for just being like most of our doing intends. I ended up saying I am being with purpose (?!?) and someone else said they are doing with no purpose, so whatever!

xoxo amrutaa
photo: sittin’ on the dock of a lake…, Clinton Lake State Park

rewilding #45 tlc

TLC: Trusting the unknown, Leaping into the unknown, Celebrating the unknown

xoxo amrutaa
photo: Tom, Kathy, David, Luciana

rewilding #44 playful

I deeply value opportunities to be playful & silly. Let’s please build castles and do cartwheels in the sand. 

xoxo amrutaa
photo: Kansas River sandbar yoga playtime

rewilding #43 messy

A life where there is love is messy. Life without love is neater, but neatness is really preferable only in bathrooms and work reports. Dancing alone is often easier and certainly less complicated than dancing with someone else, but there is nothing quite so satisfying as creating even one moment of real beauty moving gracefully with another. Perhaps to find this beauty more often, these moments of moving in exquisite alignment with each other and with the music that guides us, we need to let go of our ideas of what the dance should look like and let the messiness of love guide us.
-Oriah

xoxo amrutaa
photo: beautiful to look through this fire of transformation at the messy innards, truly a heart on fire

rewilding #42 tender moment

So many deep reflections got washed away under the super moon this evening.

A sweet couple kissing underneath the bright orange moon brought tears to my ears, and I felt such gratitude for the opportunity to witness their tender moment.

xoxo amrutaa
photo: super moon rising

rewilding #41 in a dark time

in a dark time

BY THEODORE ROETHKE

In a dark time, the eye begins to see,

I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;   

I hear my echo in the echoing wood—

A lord of nature weeping to a tree.

I live between the heron and the wren,   

Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.

What’s madness but nobility of soul

At odds with circumstance? The day’s on fire!   

I know the purity of pure despair,

My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.   

That place among the rocks—is it a cave,   

Or winding path? The edge is what I have.

A steady storm of correspondences!

A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,   

And in broad day the midnight come again!   

A man goes far to find out what he is—

Death of the self in a long, tearless night,   

All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.

Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.   

My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,   

Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?

A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.   

The mind enters itself, and God the mind,   

And one is One, free in the tearing wind.

xoxo amrutaa
photo: sunset at the Wetlands