5.1.5 Commentary: LIPD Reflections

In the column to the right is 2 different Goals/Intentions/Learning trajectories that I established during my LIPD two years ago: LIPD Broad Strokes, LIPD Next Steps.  During this Learning Review, it has been a valuable experience to reflect upon what and how I set out intentions at the start of my Capstone year.  Revisiting the intentions I set helps me to evaluate my learning pathway.  This has been a powerfully transformative phase and I was surprised to learn that even several of my Broad Strokes intentions have morphed through my maturing this year.  
    I consider Broad Strokes to be an opportunity for me to lay down values in my life guiding the direction I wish to head.  Many of these broad strokes very well could have been intentions through much of my life.  I have successfully moved in this direction for many of my broad strokes and have likewise moved toward significantly higher levels of competency in many of the skills on my skill-flex sheet in addition to having accomplished many of the concrete specific goals.  
    As I gain new skills, I am paradoxically paralyzed by seizing a new professional road and allowing life to continue as is.   Indeed, my learnings upon learning help me to realize that I can learn at any point what I am most fascinated by and I trust that I will have the skills and knowledge to create work in that moment.  This contrasts in some ways the view I have of my life of learning things to learn them but often forgetting to apply them in that sweet spot of understanding.  
    I am truly in awe of how much time I have left on this planet and all the possible projects and learnings that remain possible.   

The two most significant Growing Edges for me in 2015-2016 are my path as permaculturalist/designer and accepting my place as a healer.
I have made huge strides as a healer in the past few years: being honored as director of the Tassajara crew, receiving attunement as Reiki master and an internal feeling that I truly am a gifted healer.
Permaculture Designer.  Fun that as my OP 4 was wrapping up, my neighbor asked me to do a garden design for his land and a local school asked me to teach a permaculture class.  This is a great opportunity to start in an area that I know well with a blank slate of 1/2 an acre.  I am very excited about this opportunity.

Broad Strokes
Certainly laying out the metrics of what I value in life is a useful touchstone and hopefully something that will be revisited and tweaked throughout my life on a yearly basis.    This year, I feel a deeper sense of acceptance and compassion for all other people.  This seems to be connected in my mind to a level of maturing and embracing adulthood that Gaia has undoubtedly played a role in.    Within that same thread of Soul, I am hopeful that I have a joyful and loving relationship with my partner on the verge of kids on our own homestead.
I feel more ready to be a good father (part of this that I didn't understand was that my shoulder injury felt like my chronic pain inhibited me from feeling like I could give that level of commitment to a child in a good way.)  Within Physical, I have made significant strides in my Tai Chi and Gardening practice and have felt significant growth in rehabilitating my shoulder; however, surfing and yoga have both needed to stand down in order to fully rehabilitate my shoulder.  Spiritually, I am aware that the power of community and ritual heightens my visceral experience of the divine.  I can achieve this when in isolation in nature as well however, I often don't remember to make enough ceremony around it.    So I am intending to create more group fields that gather in a sacred way.  Artistically and Mentally, I believe that most of my mental/artistic energies this year have been toward my Gaia projects so the larger/longer life projects are a bit on hold.  I do feel advancements in my movie design, landscape design, "horti-torture" as each of these have been aspects of my OP's.
I feel like my bouquet making has come fully alive and I intend to invest energy and time to this in the future.   And on top of all that, I feel hopeful that I have the space this year to begin to explore more with photography and writing (perhaps my Troilus & Cressida parody or my cookbook).  Partly inspired by Gaia, I was in close contact with the local florist for a wedding that a friend had here in Baja; consequently, I hired him for an afternoon consult to see how he would create bouquets out of my land (as opposed to cut flowers).  This improved my bouquet making in several ways with awareness of what other flowers here I might use and largely with more awareness to background.  Also, he used something in the vase that helps hold water that was fun to play with.  
Concrete Next Steps
I thought it was very appropriately ironic in my pre-capstone learning review to highlight the fact that NONE of my concrete next steps from my LIPD happened in the course of my pre-capstone year.  
With reflection, I see that concrete next steps in some ways meant to me, "What else could I hope to accomplish outside of the realm of my professional work and my Gaia studies?"  And I am ready to acknowledge that it is a tall order to expect much more out of myself.  At times over the past year, I have fantasized about taking a year or two off without any work obligations to simply see what I would do with my time.  I think this could be a very powerful tool to understand myself on a deeper level--to see what I actually would do.  However, I also realize that it would completely depend if I landed in NYC, Baja, Thailand or California.  And there is a significant chance that I would create projects similar to my Gaia OP's that would preempt allowing the present to arise.  I am curious these days about allowing the present to arise.  and how this fits into my relationship with Design.  As a designer, I think forethought and planning is indispensable but I want more space for the moment to unfold exactly as it needs to.  
Highlights:  I did do the Herbal Symposium, 2 different chi gong workshops plus finding a third teacher on my retreat here in Baja.  I studied with one of Mantak Chia's co-teachers, and received my Reiki Master training.   Plenty of play with chocolate and infusion and plenty of learning on herbalism and chocolate.  I realize that depending how broad or specific my concrete next steps are informs how realistic it is to fulfill those steps.  
Skillflexes:  I have significantly grown in all the articulated skillflexes for my capstone year.  See the chart on 5.1.4 for specific growth within each skillflex.  Overall, I am still not a master at any of my skills; and the broad range of skills where I have vastly improved is inspiring as I continue to grow and evolve in many wonderful ways.