And life is beautiful ......... As it is

I haven't been able to sit and write again since my last post, I think that just being in my life, being present with so much going on and me working it all out has given me the opportunity to not write but to let the words rise, slowly and in their own time, much like preparing a loaf of amazing bread, allowing it to expand and grow, and when ready (only when ready) to bake it and allow it be presented in its beauty and completeness.  The loss of my beloved friend and her daughter and friend really shook my core, it shattered me into a space of needing to just find out who I am in this world and to take a moment to just breathe and be with the knowledge and the deep innate wisdom of life, being alive, breathing in and breathing out.  And I am sure there will be many moments in what is left of my life in this reality that I will stop and take a moment to assess where I am, who I am and connect with the fragility of this life. And of course accepting and embracing my vulnerability and allowing what is to be what is.

A year ago, today,  I left London and flew back home to South Africa and my new life.  I had a plan, I was filled with so many emotions, trepidation, uncertainty and wonder of how the future would unfold for me.  And here I am a year later, honouring and celebrating my beloved mother who would have been 82 today, in my 3rd term of studying which has embarked me on the most unbelievable journey of self discovery and wonder,  and more settled in myself than I think I have ever been.  I am beginning to love my life in Cape Town and am feeling 'at home' within me, enriched by the incredible people I am meeting and connecting with.

My trip to Israel was an amazing interlude to my year for many reasons and meeting and reconnecting with my beloved beautiful daughter has enriched my life more that my humble words can express.  There are so many stories to share about and I feel that I will do a series of stories here capturing moments that have enriched my life so much and created the colour and intensity that fills each and every moment.

I celebrate Beltane tonight, which is a time of integration between the divine feminine and the divine masculine, the great rite, and for me a time of an integration within myself, of honouring my place on the earth and a space and allowing my divine creativity to be birthed abundantly.  I feel I am unfolding and flowing in tune with all and with this comes a huge gratitude.

And so I say with a full heart ...... life is beautiful ..... as it is.

Om shanti shanti shanti

Be blessed
Always

How to say goodbye ..............

I am sad - my heart is open and vulnerable and I am dealing with a loss of a beloved angel friend and her daughter and their friend who died in a car accident last night (19 August) and have left in a very crazy time - death, destruction, dishonesty, fear, loss, and so many questions.  When I heard of this accident and the loss the shock was immense, its unbelievable that 3 beautiful souls from our community could just go, like that, gone ! I am feeling shattered and absolutely devastated at this loss and confused and at the same time it feels okay, that they are free, flying free from their physical attachments, there are many souls that were there to meet them and its fascinating at how random death is.  Last week I witnessed a fire dancer that I have worked with for more than 10 years, who is professional and a dear friend, catch on fire in a moment when I was feeling so happy, connected and in a space of absolute bliss drumming and feeling as one,  the image is still behind my closed eyes of his head burning, he survived and is healing, another random act.

The vulnerability and fragility of life, of us all.  So whats is all really about this thing we call life ?  I wonder how many blog posts have been written about this - what is it all really about ?

I started writing this post on the 20th August .......... its the 30th today, 10 days later and tomorrow is the memorial service for these beloved goddesses and I am still in a place of such deep sadness and profound loss.  Usually I can find some spiritual understanding and depth about life and death and what happens between, and with this loss, there are many truths that I am being shown and am understanding, but still there is a sense of surreal-ness and unbelievability about this.  And the question I have been asking myself every morning as I wake up and before I go to sleep at night, is why ?  why them and why all 3 and why like that and why, why, why .......... and that is a rhetorical question for sure as there is no answer ....... just a space of an in breath and an out breath and then no breath, and how is not relative either or when, its random.

So we live, now, we breathe, we experience joy, we experience sorrow, life happens and there are no guarantees, there is no norm,  and with each in breath and out breath there is our life experience.

I am going to Israel on Monday the 2nd to meet with my beloved daughter, Nicole, whom I have not seen since March 2011.  This is our first trip to the holy land.  Meeting her now has become the most important and necessary thing for us to do.  And in the midst of the turmoil and threats of war and destruction, this present experience of being in the now, of living life, of taking the risks as there are no guarantees comes up and again I feel pressed to put into practice the mightiness of the words I speak.

I received an email from a friend I met whilst travelling last year, warning me against going to Israel at this time.  In the space of numbness and grief that I am experiencing right now it was such a fascinating email to get, and I appreciated so much her love and care for my wellbeing.  I wrote back to her explaining that there is life and there is death and in between there is breath, choosing to live the amazing joy filled beautiful life possible and that I am choosing to focus on the love, the peace, the light and the joy.  And it is within that awareness that I find the answer to the question Why ? - Why Not !

To beloved Ursula, Gali and Kesia - your light, your beauty, your purity are a gift to all that knew and loved you.  Your presence brought joy and magnificence to your families, loved ones, our community and tribe and to the world.  My life has been so enriched and I am honoured to have been able to love you, to share amazing times with you and to call you my beloved friends.  Thank you for touching my life and for the joy that you brought to me.  Thank you for gracing my path and sharing this journey with me. I love you beloved ones, until we meet again, Shalom - Om shanti shanti shanti xxx

Saying goodbye and remembering

I wanted to write about grief and deep sadness, about what I am feeling right now that the father of our nation and the inspirational human being - Nelson Mandela, is preparing for his journey home to be with his ancestors and at the same time honouring my beloved mother, born Myra Steckoll, who passed on the 27th June 1993 - 20 years ago.  Its a time of deep reflection and for me a time to honour the past 20 years, where I have been and how my life has changed so much during this time.

My beautiful mother on her wedding day 23 December  1957.

One of my memories,  is that when my mother passed one of the things I was most sad about is that she didn't witness our new democracy and Nelson Mandela becoming our very first freely elected president.  My mom died when things were crazy in South Africa and we were so unsure of what the future held.  We spoke about this in her last few months and how it has been to be a black person in the old South Africa and how things would maybe change.  We were so unsure then, we didn't know the miracle that was about to unfold.  When I stood for hours in the queue on the 27 April 1994, I held my mother so in my heart, knowing that somehow she was with me and we were voting for this new democracy together.

The stories that we carry from those days, the days of darkness and so much violence and fear, of the most horrible crimes against innocent people, the chaos, the weird rules imposed on us that kept us separated and in the dark, need to be told and shared.  Fear and control, people taking risks and being arrested for crazy things, beaten for nothing, killed because of the colour of their skin and for not having a "dom-pass" when they walked on the streets after 8 at night.  Memories of going to Johnny Clegg concerts at Good Hope Stadium, and when he sang Asimbonanga, the security police would stand with guns on the top floor while we lit our lighters and sang for Mandela on Robben Island and our freedom which one day, may come.

There are so many memories, so much sadness and so much opportunity to celebrate, grow and change.  I can't quite believe its 20 years since my mother died, its such a long time.  There is so much of my life and experiences I haven't been able to share with her.  Nicole, my daughter was 12 years old when her granny died, she's going to 32 this year - so much of her growth and her amazing life experiences that I haven't been able to share with my mom, in real time.  But I have shared each moment of those 20 years with her as she lives within me and within my heart and my memories always.  I carry her in me and with me always and we walk my journey and that of my daughter together.

And I believe that we will walk with Madbia and carry him in our hearts and in our lives forever - its not a loss, its not goodbye, it never really is as there is no real separation.  There is the absence of the body, but never of the soul.  I know that because I was with my mother just after she took her final breath, and I felt her everywhere, I knew deep in my very being that she had expanded and taken on something far greater than her physical body.  And I felt her in my heart and I knew, really knew.

Grief is an amazing experience if we allow it be.  Its a gift, an opportunity to celebrate the life, honour the person, the love, and to feel our own vulnerability. The aspect of ourselves that has to confront our own mortality and face our own death and moving on from this physical plane.  We, as a nation are going into a period of deep grief and of mourning.  Its time to take a moment out of the daily mayhem and busyness and take some time to say thank you, to honour and celebrate a human being who has brought so much light, peace, forgiveness, reconciliation and absolute joy into our lives and brought into being something so very great, a rainbow nation and possibilities of peaceful change.

When I was in Italy last year, at the Vatican, the day before Good Friday and I went to the shop where I bought a few trinkets, I met a nun who was from an Asian country, can't remember where.  She asked where I was from and I told her South Africa, and she looked at me, smiled and said "You have Nelson Mandela".  I said yes smiling back.  We shared a moment and she said "you are very blessed in South Africa to have such a beautiful soul like Nelson Mandela."  and I replied "I wish South African's would really know that",  well, I think we do know that now.

I miss you mom.

Hamba kakuhle Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela




Be in Peace x

The Art of motherhood

Being a mother is an art, the most exceptional journey that can happen in a woman's life - a gift that shapes and changes our lives as women and opens the heart in a way that is so profound, and it never closes, ever.

I remember the day I gave birth, its wasn't the most amazing time in my life at all, it was a day seeped in so much fear, darkness and pain and yet the moment I held this being on my chest as she was born, and she suckled from my breast for the first time my heart exploded open and my life was suddenly filled with so many colours and so much light.  I remember that moment and that is a moment in my life that connects me always to the beautiful woman who is my daughter.

My daughter is in China at present and I haven's seen her for over a year, I miss her and yet her fulfilling her dreams and making the most her life, her being happy and fulfilled is more important to me that anything else and this is the absolute knowing of the state and feeling of unconditional love.

As my role of being a mother has developed and grown through the years as my daughter has developed and grown, and by me making as many mistakes and deep errors that have shaped our relationship over the years, I now can be in the space of meditation about this gift that has been bestowed upon me and really honour and bless being a mother.

I haven't only mothered my daughter, I have mothered and nurtured so many and will continue to do that, I am an Earth Mother and have the capacity to give, and hold and love, one of the most extraordinary gifts that I have received.

When I look at the role of being a daughter and the sadness I hold around my relationship with my mother, who died in 1993 and who only in the last few months of her life, was able to find that space of acceptance and love I searched for my whole growing life with her, I get both sad and happy, and am so blessed that we did have the time to find the space of love between us and reconnect the cord of gold that had been severed over the years.  Was I a good daughter, did I fulfil the role of being the very best that I could be, no not at all.  I remember when I had my daughter I made a promise to myself and to her that I would not repeat the same mistakes that my parents had made and be a completely different mother to her than I had been mothered.  I had a wonderful teacher in my mother, and I did change certain aspects of mothering my daughter, but I created a whole lot of other aspects that my daughter is challenged to deal with and work through.  How incredible it is being aware of the lessons and the challenges we hand to our children to shape and mould their lives.

I have felt so open writing these words and honouring my mother, my daughter and myself, for this role of motherhood and of being a mother and a daughter, I am truly grateful.

Om shanti shanti shanti xxxx

Its Monday 22 April, 2013, Earth Day and I am in the process of writing assignments reaching the end of my first term of being a student and completing 3 modules towards my degree BSoc Sci in Psychology.  And what a gift I have given myself - I am really loving the process of being a student, of studying, learning, integrating and grounding the amazing world of the human psyche.

I keep wanting to sit and write my blog and share what I am experiencing and learning but first of all I just don't seem to have the time and then I am not always sure how much everyone is interested in the intricacies of my studies and learning processes.  For me its inspiring, its expanding and the travelling that I did last year on my sacred adventure, is happening deep within my own psyche, an adventure and  a journey that I am enjoying and experiencing to its fullest, although it doesn't contain the same external beauties like the amazing places I visited and shared last year, its beautiful on another exceptional level.   I wish I could express the colours and the depth of this adventure, and I suppose I do with my words and my writing, and is expressed in the beauty that is surrounding me in the unbelievably beautiful city I have chosen to live in. I need to undertake to write more and share more and give you all some of the tastes of life in South Africa, in Cape Town and in my world. And it helps me to ground and formulate my journey if ever I feel off my path and not connected.  This is medicine for my soul and I am so grateful to have the space to write and share like this.

There have been amazing adventures I have been on in the 4 months of living here in Cape Town and 6 months since returning home.  Every now and again I get an opportunity to share some of the stories of my journey last year and the amazing places I visited and people that I met, and I get a big smile on my face as I tell people about where I went and who I met and connected with and the sacred and exceptional journey I had.  And seeing so many places on movies or on tv reminds me of how blessed I am to have been able to visit so many and see so many famous landmarks.  AHHHHH - the sound of the heart - in deep gratitude for the opportunities I have had, and am having and experiencing right now.

So let me share a bit about my life in Cape Town - I never realised when I decided to relocate to Cape Town after returning to SA after my life changing adventure, how challenging it would be.  When I landed I didn't know where I fitted in and as I didn't have a home or even a home town for a while, it was really weird - I needed to ground on many levels, and one of the first things I did when I moved into my new home was plant some herbs in the earth - touching the earth and growing herbs is so rewarding and enriching and this has helped to ground and I now have a worm farm where I am feeding my kitchen peels and scraps and the worms are creating amazing food for my plants - its a beautiful cycle that feeds my soul and my life deeply. Its simple but creating this has really made me feel part of the process of living with the earth.  I am growing spinach, celery, parsley and beetroot now as I am juicing every morning and picking my own leaves (if the snails leave me anything :-( ) is such a rewarding thing.  Hout Bay is filled with many sources of delicious, home grown, organic veges and salads and so I am able to source so much food grown with love and not messed with in any way - another amazing blessing and something I missed hugely while travelling - we have wonderful fresh grown food here in SA.  No more sugar and wheat filled pastries for me !!!!!

On 14th February we participated in the world Rising Up against women abuse and I played my drum as part of the dances in the community of Hout Bay - it was a wonderful sharing and my first step into this community as a drummer and sharing what I have to offer in the way of rhythm and connection - standing in a circle with about 30 members of the community, and holding the energy about the day and what it was we were standing for, was a very deep and touching experience for me.  Much about my own journey rose up that day, and where I have come from and how much I have to offer and share  now, from where and who I am.  Coming back to Cape Town for me has been a full circle and the woman I am now, in 2013 is very different from the broken, fragmented woman I was as a survivor from a horrendous marriage and a young mother, in the 1980's.  This is part of my story and I feel it has so much worth and power to heal and inspire me and many other women and girls.

My sacred drumming and rhythm workshops have begun, every full moon, connecting with women and they are really beautiful and inspiring.  I have found an incredible space in Hout Bay where I am holding the full moon circles (www.avalonvillage.co.za) and this has opened a sacred beautiful awareness around me and through this I have met some very inspiring women.  I am working with a beautiful woman one on one doing spiritual and drum therapy and am looking to expand this offering and my sacred drumming & rhythm workshops.



My facebook page for this is : https://www.facebook.com/nidhisacredrhythm.

Beloved Turiya (http://www.divinemeetings.com/turiya-interview-about-her-work-and-trainings) came to Cape Town to facilitate a workshop/training on the Diamond Essence - the work of deep experience on essence.  This was such an amazing opportunity for me to reconnect with beautiful people and recreate a space for me in this new community and touch into what is familiar and safe for me.  I loved the 4 day workshop, and was really able to touch some of the obstacles within and understand more about my own essence and my space in this world.

There are so many more exceptional stories that I can share and yet I feel this is sufficient for now and it feels contained and complete.  My life is inspiring and although I am feeling a loneliness and still a stranger in this city, and in fact within myself, as I assimilate and land and ground, whenever I take a moment a reflect, like I have done now, I am aware of how inspired and blessed I am.  I am connected and held in all that I am doing and am trusting the power of this beautiful life, as it is !

I will write again soon, and I send blessings, love and peace to the world - om shanti shanti shanti.

Pure Love

And so my new year, my new life and my new adventure has begun.  I am here in Hout Bay a suburb of Cape Town in my lovely garden apartment, with my 2 kitties, Charlotte (Moo) and Lady (Muki) and we are all 3 really happy and settled.

I miss travelling on one level very much, I made such beautiful and deep connections with people all over the world and thanks to Skype I have been chatting with friends in Brasil, Japan, Austria, Scotland, and on facebook with many others.  And all I can hope is that you all will be inspired to come and visit me in South Africa and I can offer you some of our amazing, warm, joyous hospitality and the natural beauty which is incredible and so beautiful.

This blog post is so overdue and I would like to begin by wishing you all a blessed and incredible 2013.  13 is my lucky number and it feels good and shifted this year, mainly because I have shifted and begun new adventures, but also there is a lightness and an awareness that is permeating the globe right now and people are resonating more and more light.  There is so much to be grateful for and to celebrate with the abundant nature we are surrounded with.  Happy Happy Happy New Year - New Beginnings and many many blessings shower you all this year.

This past week I began my studies and what an amazing experience it is to be back at school after more than 30 years and its an adjustment and a re-opening for me.  The institution that I have chosen to study at is amazing, and offers an intimate, kind, caring environment with incredible material and modules and a system of teaching that is integrated and comprehensive.  My degree should take me just over 3 years, 9 modules per year, 3 per trimester and 200 hours of field work.  The opportunities and how I will proceed thereafter remains to be seen, but I am working with my project Transformation Through Rhythm to do research for my paper and book on the psychological and therapeutic effect of drumming and rhythm in the treatment of trauma and creating wellbeing.

I have been spending time while awaiting to begin my studies, preparing my website and getting clear on my work for my future in Cape Town.  This has been a wonderful experience for me formulating my vision and my dreams and grounding them so that I can move forward and become more and more the authentic, congruent woman with clear purpose and clear vision.

www.premnidhi.com - this is my website which is still in progress but a beginning.  Please give me feedback and your thoughts.












this photo is me drumming on Cape Town waterfront with the band Masala - what an honour and privlige for me and new connections with wonderful people.

Tomorrow is 14 February - Valentines Day and the day that 1Billion Rise up again women and child abuse.  This is an amazing campaign where dance, music, rhythm and connection are the link and the expression to stand up and break the chains against abuse and rape.  I am rising tomorrow in 2 events.  I am a survivor of violent abuse and it feel so empowering to Rise Up and stand strong amongst so many amazing women and men, especially for those who can't.

www.onebillionrising.org 

My life is beautiful - its inspiring and I am making my dreams come true.
I am blessed and each day opens the doors to new things for me and wonderful people, places, activities are coming into my path.  What a gift it all is.
My blog will develop and grow differently - I hope you will stay with me and continue to share my journey as it unfolds.

Thank you - bless you - happy valentines day for tomorrow.

fill yourself, your life, your environment, your connections 

with pure LOVE !!!

Home

Sat 8 December 2012

I have just read that Nelson Mandela has been admitted into hospital for tests, and it makes me think of how that one of the biggest resistances I had when embarking on my adventure was to not be here in my beloved South Africa if he died.  Well he didn't and here I am at home again, and I know that he is tired and will get called to return to his ancestors one of these days.  But each time I read that he is not well, or in hospital, there is a pain that creeps into my heart, this man is a master and an icon in these time. He is the one of the significant features in my travels where whomever I met in 10 countries, over 8 months, referred to this wonderful human being with so much love and so much reverence.  And he is an anchor that we owe so much gratitude to for teaching us all about forgiveness and reconciliation. 

I can't quite believe that its over a month since I returned home, and here I am in my new home in Cape Town and my life has completely changed and shifted.  I haven't been on line much over this past month and a bit,  and have tried on 2 occasions to write my next blog post, and both times, wrote but was not able to complete the task for various reasons.  Well, I am determined to complete it tonight as I have been feeling disconnected and distant from all the extraordinary people I met in the world, and feel a real need to connect and share a little of what its like to be home on African soil and how amazing this country really is.

I said that I had started writing on 2 different occasions and want to share these writings as they came from a space that was freshly returned and capture what I was feeling and experiencing at the time.

Tuesday 13 November :
Its from Claremont in Cape Town that I am writing after registering at my college for a Bachelor of Applied Psychology which I begin on 4 February 2013 and its wonderful to have the opportunity to just sit here, in a very funky tea shop, and catch up with my blog. I haven't really landed as yet and I think the thing that is overwhelming me is making so many arrangements after having very few over the past 8 months. How different my life is about to become and I am working on just grounding myself and keeping the inner divinity in tact.  Its been 12 days since I landed back in SA and I still wake up each morning and have to take a moment to ascertain where I am in the world.  And I am still living out of my suitcase wearing the same clothes, which although I have unpacked temporarily into a cupboard - wow amazing - still will have to be regathered when I move at the end of this month to Cape Town.

And then I will unpack and start making my nest again - its going to be amazing ! So how is it being back I am asked ?  And my replies vary from amazing, wonderful, not sure yet, still grounding  .....but what is the most amazing of all is how familiar everything is and although I feel completely different within, everything around me is the same as before and sometimes I have remind myself that I have been away from the Garden Route for 8 months.

I have decided 2 things about my blog - one is that Nidhi's Sacred Adventure will continue and although it may not be the same in the way of me visiting so many amazing countries and  places, my journey of growth, adventure and experiences will continue and the journey of my amazing work with diverse groups using drumming, rhythm, life awareness and sacred divinity will create wonderful stories and sharing and I am sure will continue to inspire.  And two is that I am looking into turning my blog into a book and growing the  stories of my travels.  As soon as I have settled into my new life, this will be a new part of my sacred divine adventure,exciting timesahead.

Monday 19 November 
So how is home for me ? its such an interesting concept suddenly, as home for the past nearly 10 months has been exactly where I am in each moment. And there has been little attachment to any specific abode at all as its been quite temporary. In my visions and dreams I wish for a settled space somewhere in the world where I can potter in mygarden, cook delicious and nutritious food and create a sacred divine space to be in ! and I will create this wherever I choose to live or be,but I keep feeling that home is deeply where my connection with spirit is and in so many moments of my days when I am swimming in the sacred river, or walking in the forest, drumming and playing rhythms and connecting with others and sitting around a table communing with my loved ones, and many, many more moments like these that I am connected and I am at home. Its such a beautiful awareness to come to this place within myself. Home is my connection with God, with All that Is and that includes the all aspects of life.

South Africa is the most magnificent country, the spaces, the weather, the sunrises and 
the sunsets, the abundant nature and the rich diversity of its beautiful people. And 
seeing the stories around me of poverty, of lack, of sadness, of opulence, of joy, of music and colour and creativity and of everything that makes up life here, I am looking and feeling connected to it all and grateful once again that my connection and my spirit hasvastness and depth of light, joy, peace and an acceptance of all that is.  
South Africa is ALL THAT IS and how amazing it is to come home to this place of learning,acceptance, tolerance, forgiveness, joy, rhythm, beauty, connections, music, and natureand to just Love it all. I am looking through different eyes and the eyes of my soul are shifted too and I know that it is exactly where I need to be right now.

And back to Sat 8 December, and where I am right now. I have just moved into my new home in Hout Bay which is in Cape Town. I have spend the past week unpacking my lovely things and touching base with a life that I placed in a storage garage for much of this past year and its been amazing to re-create my home and find a special place for all the parts of myself in a relaxed and quite different way. And to keep witnessing myself quite shifted and different and needing different things to keep me balanced and connected to my centre and my core.

I am off tomorrow on another adventure, which is exciting and will give me the opportunity to Be in nature, under the incredible African skies, writing and creating in a retreat space in Standton which is close to Hermanus on the east coast.

6 days in a special place in Africa, working with ancient story, observing the end of the year and exploring a new cycle.

This is perfect way for me to end off my year and prepare for the steps that I have taken in creating a new life and a new way of being. I am looking forward to writing and learning and experiencing so much more in the new year and sharing my adventures.

Until I write again in 2013, I would like to say thank you to you all for sharing my journey with me this year, for your encouragement, feedback, inspiration, friendship and just for being there and making it so exciting for me to write and share with you.

I wish you peace, light and love for the new year and new cycles. We are the people we have been waiting for and we hold so much love and so much light to shift and expand this incredible world into new beginnings.

Om Shanti Shanti Shanti

Nidhi xxxx