Bowing In Unison

Art by Elliott Aaron From

We are trees, grounded, lifted, nourished in some seasons, shedding in others. We all dance in the winds of our beginnings, hoping to be rooted deeply enough to stand tall, endure the chaotic winds that bully us, and harsh storms that attempt to break us. 
We sink into the clay of our ancestry while reaching towards the divine light of individuation. 
We reach out in the heat of summer, endure the harsh winters to flourish again and again, and yet again, steeping in the sun, our tough exteriors penetrated. We bend to the challenges, shedding limbs of no purpose, sometimes violently, while allowing branches of meaning to strengthen and bloom. None of us is like another, each displaying its own hues, textures, shape of leaves and fullness of integrity. Swaying in the winds of change, collective are our wishes to return one day to wherever-- maybe to a place of understanding of why we landed in the soil we did, why we blossomed with those colors at that time, why we stood tall when others had fallen. 
We are all trees breathing, stretching, bowing in unison to the mother that receives us, the father that calls us. As our lush leaves flutter, dancing in the Earthly winds we hold hope that one day we will know for certain-- why we have been. 


Tricia Schwaba onset of 2024

For A New Beginning by John O'Donohue-- Preface by Maria Popova

There are moments in life when we are reminded that we are unfinished, that the story we have been telling ourselves about who we are and where our life leads is yet unwritten. Such moments come most readily at the beginning of something new.

To begin anything — a new practice, a new project, a new love — is to cast upon yourself a spell against stagnation. Beginnings are notation for the symphony of the possible in us. They ask us to break the pattern of our lives and reconfigure it afresh — something that can only be done with great courage and great tenderness, for no territory of life exposes both our power and our vulnerability more brightly than a beginning.

Maria Popova

For A New Beginning by John O’Donohue

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

Time Is of the Essence-- Poetry by Tricia

art source— anon

Time is of the essence, what does that mean? 

Does it mean I’m running late? Need a change of scene?

Life whirled around me in my much younger years

Distracting me with chaos, calling in my fears.

In this present moment I feel free of the denial

That led me to nothing but shit stacked in a pile

True, time is of the essence but so is gratitude

Each day expressed, it shifts collective attitudes. 

Our essence is a jewel mined from deep within

Clear of ancestral patterns, it can tell us how it is

Crack the stubborn shell stretching limbs to divine 

We emerge from the dark of a weary, tired mind. 

Tricia Schwaba, from the archives

Waiting on the Cold White

The stark, icy cold of winter has yet to grace the north— the whiteness, the no-complication, the no-contour, the many shades of white layered on various shades of gray. Today I see remnants of autumn with its hollowness. I feel a void of seasonal change— the uncertainty of the Oaks as they hold tight to their few remaining leaves, the green mosses shine chartreuse, confused though brilliant, shrouded in a near-blue frost as they await the chance to rest and lie dormant. Today they still feel the heat of the Earth warming their tiny roots and reaching towards the suns periodic kisses on the tips of their beings.

I remain in hope that starkness will arrive ridding the landscape of the complication of muted hues and lake water that still moves under the too-thin layer of uncertain ice. I cling to the hope that the presented landscape will once again offer me a blank page on which to spew my new aspirations and my, as yet recognized, winter-oriented insights.


I’ve always appreciated, even needed, the starkness of winter and its simplicity. The freeze offers opportunities— a snapshot moment but for months on end, allowing nature to slow and stand still. In other seasons varying, vibrant colors are on display, swaying in both graceful and severe movements. Scents grab us and throw us into the past, our eyes are tempted into the spectrum of hues and the birds awaken us with their symphonies of sound. The eyes, the ears, the nose, can be caught in a sensual whirlwind. But winter is less demanding, offering time to hibernate, even contemplate about where we’ve been and where we are headed. We can dream about the blessings of warmth, appreciate the slow thaw and its accompanying new growth, small eruptions of green on the thinning blanket of white, bubbling over with possibility.

Time, space and quiet are conducive to the creative energy reset, a re-contextualizing, an embracing of the heat of new perspectives after which we can once again honor the words— “Hope springs eternal.”

Tricia Schwaba, December 26, 2023

Full Circle Wellness

In 1998 I helped create a group that would exploring the idea of wellness before wellness was called wellness. After discussing our collective intention we discussed names for our group and came up with a good one— I see that now. I wrote the following poem in honor of our journey.

I post this to remind myself my path has been consistent throughout my life. I don’t ever remember a time when I didn’t wonder how I could better, or more expeditiously, heal myself or how I could inspire others to take loving care of themselves. Perhaps I’ve come full circle.

Tricia Schwaba (nee Tricia Higgins) 1998

The Energy Codes-- Dr. Sue Morter,

“Dr. Valerie Hunt at UCLA was the first to discover the relationship between changes in our biofield and our health, and she determined that problems in the body actually start in the energy field. “Until now,” she said, “many human diseases have been characterized as ‘etiology unknown.’ In other words, the cause of the disease could not be determined, and therefore the only possible treatment was alleviation of symptoms. But physiological symptoms appear because of the field disturbance. If we correct the disturbance in the field, the symptoms disappear and we have been healed. If we treat the symptoms directly, then when a stressful situation once more aggravates the incoherent energy that is the source of the problem, the disease condition returns.””

— The Energy Codes: The 7-Step System to Awaken Your Spirit, Heal Your Body, and Live Your Best Life by Sue Morter