So this last week, I got married! I do a weekly check-in over in a different part of the web where I go over the good and the hard. This week’s “good” was over the top, so I thought I’d share some of it here.

(Photos by my dad, Ken Stolz. We had another photographer as well, but I don’t have those pictures yet.)

Good moments from my wedding week:

The day of the ritual:

- We finally got the ceremony written at the last minute. You know how sometimes things come together and everything is beautiful and perfect in every single imperfection? And you can’t imagine changing one second of it? That’s how the ceremony was.

- The morning before the ritual we did some tantric breathing exercises and I have never in my life been more ecstatically at home in my body. Just by breathing!

- Writing the ceremony was a HUGE symbolic transformation for me. It integrated Wiccan-me with Now-me in a way that feels congruent and beautiful and so so very important.

- Being surrounded by my favorite people, all wishing love and happiness on me. Everywhere I looked were smiles and hugs upon hugs upon hugs. And I was just there in it – telling everyone how much I loved them and smiling my face off.

The day of the celebration:

- More of my favorite people. (Andy was there!)

- Being serenaded with “I’ve Just Seen a Face,” which is “our” song. And he included a verse on kazoo! So special! And hilarious!

- DELICIOUS gluten-free vegan organic food. The leftovers of which are sitting in my refrigerator.

- The Not-Quite-A-Guestbook, where we invited people to draw, use stickers, etc. And the HILARIOUS things the hubster’s family made (ahaha!) and the sweet and beautiful and wonderful things from everyone.

- Seeing my husband(!)’s biological and adoptive families in one place. And appreciating the interplay of both sides in him – how it’s made him uniquely who he is. Also, his biological brother looks exactly like him, except blonde and skinny.

- Watching the hubsters, his brother, and my brother, have so much fun shooting nerf guns at each other.

- How many of our friends dressed up as pirates…

Overall and in between:

- Bubbles everywhere.

- The two mini-breakdowns, one of which was fixed by a hug, and one of which was fixed by a massage. So helpful!

- All the minor disasters that resolved within 30 seconds and with almost no anxiety. Lovely little reminders of held-ness and loved-ness. (Celebration site reserved for the wrong day. Ritual site flooded by a broken water pipe. Getting mud all over my dress. None of it mattered a whit.)

- The two days of the ritual and celebration were the only two sunny days this week. And they were GLORIOUS. Slightly breezy, not too hot, and just BEAUTIFUL. (I suspect Portland is trying to keep us.)

- Presents! Thoughtful kind beautiful presents! (Not just “more stuff.”) Including a lot of art made especially for us by our talented artist friends. (My fabulous ex gave me an original piece by his grandfather, who in addition to being a famous artist, was one of my favorite people and supported my own art in a big way. So special!)

- My love bought me a rocking chair! And it is so beautifully perfectly exactly what I was wanting, and he found it for super cheap and brought it home for me!!

- Simone’s Yoga Nidra recordings, which are entirely responsible for the little sleep I managed to get. So grateful to her for making them, and to me for thinking to listen to them. Mmmmmm…rest.

- Just enough downtime to make the uptime amazing. I am tired and very much looking forward to our honeymoon at the beach next week, but a large portion of me would like to have another week with all those people around.

- Finding out, for the first time, what it’s like to actually enjoy being surrounded by people. And realizing that it’s a direct result of my work on sovereignty and force fields. Crossing the bridge to become, in a much deeper way, Me-who-is-always-in-her-force-field.

Becoming the Next Me

In mid May I went from talking about how I wanted to teach sexuality “someday” to actually creating a concrete plan for my first class.

It lit a fire under me, and under other people to. To be able to share this gift of living presently but compassionately with my sexuality…that’s what I want to give everyone. And a lot of people want to learn.

I’m offering a Mindful Sexuality Telephone Class (but it’s more like a Blanket Fort) on July 11th, and if it’s something that speaks to you, I’d love for you to come.

Scheduling that class was a huge leap of faith for me. I want to teach it from a completely new place for me – one where I hold a force field, a culture, and invite people to make their own explorations in sovereignty, instead of trying to give them the “right” thought forms. I’ve already been making this shift in my Shiva Nata classes, but I wanted to go even deeper with it.

So I’ve been practicing in every single moment. And it’s how I went about this wedding. Using radiant presence to set an energy, a culture, and then letting people interact with that in their own way.

The results were astonishing. I sit here humbled, astonished, and so grateful. Even attending my wedding ritual and celebration required me to be a person who can accept so much more love than before. I sit here so very excited to be on my way towards this new version of me, the one who can teach from a place of deeper integrity and permission.

Again, I’d love for you to join me.

So very much love,
Rhiannon