Home is...

...where the heart is.

This has a whole new meaning for me right now. It is oh-so-clear to me that home is the abode my heart is invested in being in. I have learned a lot about "home" recently. "Home" has changed so much. In the last couple years, we have lived in a huge house of our own, a medium house of our own, an RV of our own, a van of our own, and now staying with a friend in her home.

I used to struggle with feeling at home in our home. I had so many issues about it being clean enough, and then about it being too clean and feeling sterile. I was uncomfortable, and so I think people sensed my discomfort and felt uncomfortable, too. People didn't come over and stay all day every day, and we didn't have a lot of friends who we did that with, either.

I always longed for it. And I love love LOVE being here with my friends. Finally, I feel like I am living tribally, communally. This is such an amazing exercise in togetherness.

I love staying with my friend in her home, but I am ready to have our own home, to be in our own home.

I got into the RV knowing that afterward I was going to live in a house on some land and grow roots, family depth, and everlasting community. I am ready to invest in some land, on some land, into some land. Our family is bursting with an abundance of ideas for our land, like a labrynth, a tree house, a garden, a huge sandbox, lots and lots of outdoor area for play and exploration. A swing for me and my beloved to sit in on a warm night or a beautiful day. A fort. A playhouse with a kitchen. All of this homemade, of course. Oh, yes. Yummy to my soul.

A lease-locked box attached to the earth didn't sound appealing to me in the very recent past, even. But now, it feels like a breath of fresh air. I have so many ideas for the inside, too -- little bits that make a house feel like a warm and inviting home, a place to grow a family and a love relationship and community of unschoolers and red-tenters.

Now to convince myself that this can be manifested as quickly as I manifested this RV lol

I'm ready. We all are ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Amazon Warrior Monk Rockstar

I shaved my head to release my attachment to my hair and my attachment to my idea of beauty. I thought it was going to be a lesson in embracing the ugly. I knew it would humble and "right" me in ways I could not even know yet.

I shaved my head as a symbolic piece to a cleansing formula of my life. I released who I was to find out who I am. I let go of the old and opened up to the new. I could feel my head opening up to the universe, pouring in enlightenment and Oneness.

I felt strong, like an Amazon Warrior, and I quickly took to resonating with the title Amazon warrior monk.

I wasn't expecting to feel more radiant and sexy than I remembered ever feeling before. I felt so fresh, so alive, so free. Just wow.

And now a new chapter of this shaved head experience is emerging... I went out to a club with a few GORGEOUS friends a couple weeks ago. I kept feeling the pull to go to a club and experience some place that is so "superficial" while aligned deeply with my unattachment to my hair and my old beauty ideal. The most surprising thing happened! I haven't had so much attention and guys buying my drinks and so much FUN since I was 60 pounds lighter with blond curls down to my butt. I was a show-stopper! Wowsers!!! Suddenly, my shaved head was the "new emerging hair style that few could pull off but I did so well". Whoodathunk! So now I feel kinda like a rockstar, and I have taken to accentuating my eyes, since they POP with a shaved head :)

Everywhere I go, people rave about my shaved head. I didn't think I was going into this as "my new hairstyle" -- it was just an experience, and I was ready to get quick about growing my curls back out before I'd even shaved my head. But now, I am really feeling ROCKING this shaved head.

I feel bold and powerful. I know this was "supposed" to be the year of aligning with my "right" in preparation of stepping into my power. But "rightness" was so short-lived, and boldness seems to be my pathway to powerful. Rightness, as it turns out, didn't need to be done (like cleaning the house), but something I live, like stretching for a long walk. And I am suddenly feeling READY to be powerful.

I am learning more and more that my fears are usually just not being ready, they are sort of excuses for my gut feeling of not being ready for something. I love sinking into that readiness (or not-readiness, as the case may be) and living life a bit and seeing how it automatically corrects itself over a bazillion little moments between my acknowledgement that I am not ready and that moment when I realize "oh yeah, baby, here we go!"

Maybe without my hair, I move free-er and so am ready sooner? LOL I don't know. But I am so ready. I am ready to manifest this power and channel some AMAZINGNESS in this upcoming year. I am bold. I am powerful. I am not a watered down version of me. I am not shy. I am an Amazon warrior monk rockstar... women-circling tribe-creating goddess guru. Oh yes, this is me :) Trailblazer. Firestarter.

p.s. - my wardrobe has become more bright and brilliant, too. Pics to come :))

p.s.s. - I wrote this for Tara's blog:

It was perfect, a part of the deep cleansing I was doing, a way to take what was inside and wear it outside, a symbol of new transformation in my life. I thought it was going to be a lesson in embracing my ugly – I wasn’t expecting to feel so radiant and sexy! I have bounds of clarity, especially in what is “other people’s stuff” and what’s mine (like how some people can see my beauty, some feel shaving my head is weird, and some people were way more attached to my curls than even I was). Sometimes I feel like a monk ripe with readiness for enlightenment, and sometimes I feel like a gypsy goddess extraordinaire. One thing is for sure, this is the mark of a new beginning for me. I feel reborn. I have been making some serious space in my life over the past few months, and I look forward to growing with my hair and appreciating it all in new ways. My curls are not what make me beautiful – I am.

What's in a name...

I have a confession to make. For all my loving not fitting in boxes, I really love words that define something. As you can tell, I really love to write. I love playing with words, using them to create a feeling in another, using them to bring something that is inside me out of me, through some medium, and into you. Words are powerful things! They are like arrows pointing people to amazing places.

I have a dear friend who said once that we will have 9 names in our life. The first is chosen for us, and the remaining we chose for ourselves. The name my mother gave me upon my birth was Vanessa. In Hebrew it means "star" and in Greek it means "butterfly". This was the PERFECT name for me. I resonate with the butterfly in the way that I transcend areas of my life, like names. My biggest name change was to Radical Mama. I am STILL Radical Mama (especially to some of my dearest friends). I always will be. And then wild zen - love it! Thank you for giving me that space to dwell and grow.

Both of those names have been me naming myself something that I was aspiring toward and then feeling ready for change once I felt I had achieved it.

I knew this winter that it was time to shed my name (like my hair) and redfine myself. But I am done looking at names like a house I may outgrow. I decided to pick a name that encompassed the very essence of my soul. I looked at myself in the mirror and called myself it to see if it fit. I wrote it several times to make sure I enjoyed the asthetics of it. I delved the depths of my insides, and I sat with names to see how they fit over time.

I had a WILD synchronis moment. A couple years ago, whilst pondering the fact that if I went on to be a midwife that I might put myself out of business because of my fierce trust of unassisted birth, I started having some conversations with a few of my amazing friends (I'm so blessed to have so many of those!). We started talking about outlaw midwivery (a midwife who defies the medical path and medical rules, to aid women in birth the way it has been done since life began), and I got this vision to create a comic called Outlaw Midwife, where the main character would be this kickass woman-empowering mountaintribe-dwelling afterbirth-supporting team-mama-rallying goddess guru, and I loved the "Om"-ness of the whole thing. Well, the outlaw midwife became Ooma. And I knew that she is me in the years after my children have grown to be adults. There is so much more to this vision, but the main point is Ooma. So..... A month ago-ish while I was searching for my name, I decided I needed a birth goddess in my name. I found a website and checked each name to see if it resonated with me, and the last name on the list was Uma "goddess of all things feminine, especially birth". ABOUT KNOCKED MY SOCKS OFF!

But I don't feel like my face is ready to be called Uma or Ooma just yet. There is another name is that perfect for now.

I am Soul. Wild Soul. Wild Soul Free.

And are you ready for this? I am going to change my name legally. I am ready to sever the ties to the name my mother gave me, to the person I once was and am not longer, ready to let go of my past and embrace my present and my future. Ready to let go of who I was to become who I am.

No, I am not going to legally change my name to Wild Soul LOL

Soul Uma Rose Free

OMGosh, my initials will spell SURF! SUPER cool :D Just noticed that....

Wild is going to be more like my title than a name ;) And I will finally have the same last name as my baby :D

Soul is so kickass, the Amazon Worrior monk, guru goddess, the embodiment of all things female (strong and hard, soft and flexible), radiant and reverant, reeking of wildcat sexiness and earthy sensuality ;)

Have I mentioned already that I have been practicing stepping into my power? It is quite exquisite and satisfying. More on that later. But Soul is powerful.

I am Soul. It's nice to meet you ♥

And in other name-changing news. How do you like the new blog feel?

Wildcraftingzen: the radical act of embracing life and simply being. That is what wildcraftingzen is: taking wild life and processing it inwardly to find peace. Oh yeah, baby! So, this blog is going to be a couple different things: my outward expression of an inward journey, and my jumping off point in businesshood. I am SO ready to do some work. Stepping into my power over here, and so ready to do this. READY to do this. Here I go!

I have more changes to make on the blog, as you will see as time unfolds. I read this quote recently that keeps coming back up inside me, and I can't remember it word for word, but it goes something like, Self growth is like building a new ship from the ship you are already on while out to sea. The balance between stepping into the future and taking care of the present... What a fun dance it is :D