Alysse Aallyn

Category: #Beauty

  • The Language of Butterflies – Walking the Path of Attachment with Alysse Aallyn

    The Lovers = ALLIANCES: “Best Friends”


    Becoming a lover forges an alliance for the future. We’re not talking of two raindrops crashing into each other for sex, but a mutual declaration of interest and benefit. Spend today thinking about past alliances; not just love relationships but all alliances dreamed of, suggested, made and broken.


    What hopes, plans and fears did we enter (and exit) with? What mistakes were made? The first thing that jumps out to us is that power differentials create more problems than they solve. An alliance needs to be a two-way street; any hint of “exploitation” turns it into a different kind of relationship entirely.

    Alliances must be freely chosen, with consequences fully appreciated and maturely understood. How often in life is this even possible for us? Sometimes we are limited by the power of our imaginations as well as the resilience of our hearts. Alliances should also be freely exited but how often does THAT happen? How often do our passions (and perceived needs) fall short of our principles and how much shame does this knowledge engender? And then there are issues of temperament: to what extent can introverts/extroverts hope to change their stripes?


    Think about your deepest and most rewarding friendships. You’re looking for a special kind of Best Friend, after all, so it only makes sense that most of the components appearing in your friendships will be found in your soulmate as well. Will you appreciate some of the same things? Speak the same language? Have the same values? Laugh at the same jokes? Share fears and dreams? Expose your worst/best? You still want all that! Because you need an Ally. An ally reliably comes to your defense, as you fearlessly come to theirs.

    An ally is someone you can rely on. It means you must be honest with that person, and we all know how hard that is, especially when you can’t figure out the truth, yourself. You’re feeling your way and you need a sympathetic ear. You know you will have to be their sympathetic ear as well because otherwise what you have isn’t a partnership, it’s an autocracy. Autocrats are lied to and cheated on and they die alone. That’s not what gratifies the soul. You are looking for someone who holds the key to You and by astonishing coincidence, you will hold the key to them, as well.


    The Duel

      Europe without you
      Was a funeral feast.
      I recall the procession of your letters
      Far better than
      The stream of luckless suitors
      Trying to distract me.
      Virgins aren’t distractible.
      Your seductive missives stalked me.
      Your fatal ploy was that nude picture
      Adam lonely in his garden.
      I came right home.
      I well recall the ceremonies
      Of that night!
      Your shyness
      My perfume
      Our ignorance
      Your penis
      Soft as a
      Messenger dove that folds
      To a familiar hand –
      Then wild and hard as
      A riderless horse.
      I did cry out as the candles burned.
      I swear there were some moments when
      We actually saw each other.
      But if this magic sword cuts both ways
      Why was I the only bleeder?
      They peeled me off
      Dropping me down miles
      Of antiseptic hallway –
      A princess in a bucket.
      It could have ended there
      But at your school I haunted you
      A chilly-breasted demon.
      My daytime incarnation seemed mature:
      I fooled you;
      We chatted as you prepared the skin.
      I bit down hard and
      Tasted only
      Suture wire.
      You wrote and broke off
      Our association.
      The years groaned by
      Like convicts chained
      We served our terms with no time off
      For bad behavior.
      Lust had luster,
      Excrement had ecstasy.
      The castaways the whirlwind
      Flung upon the sand
      Were calm, polite –
      We knew our way around.
      That look you gave me!
      Our unborn children shivered
      In their sausage skins
      Suddenly aware
      Their time had come.
      The tale was done
      The frog-mask
      Shivered off
      We saw:
      The you of you
      The me of me –
      Masks
      Unmirrored –
      Scars
      Unscored
      Virgins not but
      Innocence
      Restored.

    1. The Language of Butterflies – Walking the Path of Attachment with Alysse Aallyn

      CONFLICT – “The Storm”- “Triggers & Pushback”


      How good are we at facing bad news? Do we even want to know what it is? It’s impossible to plan for the future if we don’t intelligently strategize the things that COULD go wrong. We must weigh up our assets and debits – some of which are certainly emotional.

      Are we self-sabotagers? Do we quit right before the final push? Do we make alliances with untrustworthy people? Do we make ourselves vulnerable to dangerous people? Are we secretly hoping for “rescue” – that someone all-powerful and all-competent will sweep in and take our “mess” away? Remember back to our inner power principle, the person we want to be. Maybe we get discouraged far too easily by the negative voices in our heads. The path of lifetime self-improvement after all, started with our neither being able to talk or even stand up! Practice, practice, practice: forming “muscle” – even spiritual muscle – takes a lot of time.

      Then we must face up to fearful destruction we had no part in; perhaps caused only by the principles of waste, loss and entropy to which the entire universe is subject. We need a philosophy to carry us through these times that helps us strategize thrifty methods of maximizing and healing what resources we have left. We need to know the difference between “value” and “price”. We need to recognize the outright gifts we have been given – such as the courage and determination that brings us to this place – and give thanks for them.

        Conflict is an inevitability. No heat without friction, no forward movement without energy expenditure, no flight without first shedding our comfort carapace. When we want change, we are inviting conflict.


        The question is how much in control we feel. Triggers “set us off”; i.e. trigger any chain of events we may feel helpless over. But are we? Can the chain be arrested at any point? Let’s bring our mind to focus on the problem. Human history is created by human intelligence; let’s problem-solve. “I will arrest and re-direct this change.”

        Whore De Combat

        My sutures hurt; I’m
        Completely unavailable,
        Unsheathing your ambition you
        Laced up my body like a jerkin
        Cut my breakfast with your corkscrew
        Swiss Army
        Doubled up and put away.

        I’m fasting now
        Bracing for the worst
        I can’t eat anything that won’t
        Look right at me
        And want to know the truth;
        Who’s for real?
        What’s the state of play?

      1. The Language of Butterflies – Walking the Path of Attachment with Alysse Aallyn

        Creativity : “Harness your Uniqueness”

          When searching for your soulmate this is no time to “blend with the crowd.” You need to discover exactly who you are so you can seek your complementary and missing elements. If you are uncertain or mistaken about your essential self, you won’t even recognize The One. You will be guaranteed to choose a partner based on false considerations of status or appearance. This requires you stop hiding your true self and allow it to emerge. Easier said than done! Turns out we all have been babying the shyly unique aspects of ourselves that don’t win instant recognition from the crowd. Well, we are going to have to experiment with taking Baby out for daily strolls and develop a bit of muscle. Don’t worry if the “likes” fall away – you are not trying to appeal to everyone. The creativity card means you will need to become imaginative in how you present yourself. You want someone accepting? Be accepting. You want someone brave? Be brave. You want someone who looks deeper? Look deeper.

          Fire In the Dust

          In photographs
          The ladies scream or laugh
          It’s hard to tell
          Heads back they bare their
          Grief or joy or
          Agonized relief
          It’s hard to tell.
          All that remains of them
          Tattered icons growing ever dim.

          The fountains of our fear
          Leap high at first, like dancers
          Frozen at first burst
          Of freedom
          Paralyzed abreast
          The arc
          We cannot see
          What tortuous sign these fossils
          Meant to be.

          In that first winter
          We thought the earth was dead
          Statues mated
          Trees erupted dragonflies
          The angry lonely
          Sang and cried.
          Somewhere some fetus twists and jerks
          Convergence of dynastic quirks

          So drop the toxic cloak of bitter spite that
          Melts the flesh and terrorizes night –
          Waiting out a cycle’s sum
          Spinning down to kingdom come.
          For nothing vain, came nothing plain
          This world was born
          To live again.

        1. The Language of Butterflies – Walking the Path of Attachment with Alysse Aallyn

          REGRET feeds DOUBT

            As soon as we begin refining our list in search of The One, we are filled with doubt. Fear of Missing Out dictates that even as we are talking to a Possible Soulmate our eyes search out the door to see what new person is coming in. There is a glorious book, essential to artists, called The War of Art (Steven Pressfield) which is actually about self-sabotage. In the very moments when we are trying to build something critically important to our emotional, psychic and spiritual health, a demonic voice comes out of Who Knows Where, whispering, “It’s the wrong thing and you’re doing it wrong.” According to Steven Pressfield, if you listen to this voice you will never accomplish anything, because Honest, Committed Effort is required to get your project off the ground, even if it ultimately fails. And if it ultimately fails, it will turn out to be the very project that helps you see what is Really Important, and understand What to Do Next. Choose wisely; searching for a relationship that is restorative, not exploitative, a partner who is complementary and complimentary, and push doubt aside.

            Cloverleaf


            Some roads lead nowhere;
            They’re my favorites.
            I held my breath while
            You drew my face in
            Blinding strokes
            Creamed my mouth with curling lines
            Destroyed one picture; then another
            Never let me see. You
            Left at dawn while I
            Ran in circles, calling
            Raging, spending blackened
            Nights without you,
            No blue thigh to guard
            My trusting heart while yours looks out
            To gauge the coming storm.
            Trapped in cloverleaves,
            Sentenced to school by
            Streams of angry judges –
            Balked by
             The enervating past
            Of unlived lives
            Every face I paint is yours.
            Open up the chilly ruffles
            Of my breasts
            One more time –
            To beauty; yours and mine
            Electrify your
            Eldritch spine –
             Your body so much lighter
            Than the mountain that you loved
            Better than you loved me –
             The course you learned
            Better than you learned me – so
            Overconfident that
             you’ll come back
            I float across the powdered snow
            In bird-winged silence
            All-enveloping
            Unless I’m
            Lost?

            Lost and frozen like your heart?

          1. The Language of Butterflies – Walking the Path of Attachment with Alysse Aallyn

            MELT into the space your desire creates: “You Got This”


            You’ve realize the immensity of your need and the enormity of the challenge. You’ve looked into your capacities and they just don’t seem to match your expectations. Now you’re scared and feeling hopeless. I’m here to remind you to “relax.” Melt into the space your desire has created. Untense those muscles because fear and hysteria, rage and feelings of worthlessness all work against us.

            Realize somewhere out there your Soulmate is feeling all these things also. This is a process you need to go through, in order to recognize the vastness of the challenge ahead. This is your time in the desert, where you will be tested. This guarantees that when your and your Beloved melt together your success will be all the sweeter. Of necessity to valuing the Other is the realization that, although there may be plenty of fish in the sea, you need a very particular fish.


            HAUNTED WEDDING
            The pregnant car disgorges
            Only us. It’s winter.
            Drunk as silver fish
            We beat our gills as light
            As hummingbirds.
            In an amethyst ring
            Of drypoint trees
            The half-built house
            Gapes and swells
            Its timbers stink of sap.
            Windrill fields occlude
            Our crossing, so you carry me
            High above the thorny osiers.
            We sleep aloft for safety
            Locked and levitating
            In this space of air
            One season only,
            Unseen by angry outriders;
            Bloodless in our wedding robes
            Like the doubled membranes
            Of the frozen flowers.

            1. The Language of Butterflies – the Path of Attachment by Alysse Aallyn

              POWER: “Doubling”

                We are filled with the excitement and power of acquisition and multiplicity. We will finally have a helper, an interpreter, an enabler, a sharer. A Second Self with its rich promise of Difference – different memories, body type, fantasies, wishes, dreams – we can indulge ourselves in. We can’t wait to get going and find this person who promises us wings and immortality! The potential sexual ecstasy alone is keeping us up nights. Imagine thoroughly exploring another and being thoroughly explored yourself – with a lifetime to do it in. We can’t yet speak the language of butterflies, but we can imagine it. We are giving ourselves wings. With such commitment, every moment becomes a lifetime. We think we may have discovered the secret of eternal youth, to see and be seen through the eyes of love.

                Angel Clothes

                You are like a ripe peach
                Swollen in the summer of your life
                And as the peach surrounds its stone
                Your skeleton enwombs your soul
                But thinly.
                I often see it shining
                Through the hollows in your cheeks.
                I need your body
                Need to know its shadows
                Sound its pleasures
                But as the stone
                Though small at first
                Must grow; feeds off the dying peach
                So your spirit will transhume your flesh
                Disgorge it in
                A thousand peaches a thousand summers a
                Thousand eternities more beautiful than
                You or I

              1. The Language of Butterflies: the Path of Attachment by Alysse Aallyn

                The Language of Butterflies: the Path of Attachment by Alysse Aallyn

                Assess your potential to connect. We wake alone, but we are on the path of Attachment. Ask yourself; do you seek balanced, indestructible attachment, synchronous, not disharmonic relationship; a connection that is symbiotic, not exploitative. If the answer is Yes, you are on the path of Paradise.

                How can we achieve these goals? First, we must understand and accept our Self, our Ego, with all its quirks and flaws, needs and yearnings, limits and possibilities. Then we must understand the Other; the Lover. We must attune ourselves to the structure of their yearning to begin to construct our duet, our dance. After that we must negotiate the rapids of relationship with each other and with the outside world. Danger! Excitement! Ecstasy! Despair…Compassion.
                Union.

                We are caterpillars, you and I, attempting to learn the language of butterflies. We are unprepossessing creatures, daily absorbed in infantile needs of eating and excreting, but we have a firm promise of a future in which we stretch our gorgeous wings.

                Paradise

                Without eyes

                Ambitious goldfish float

                Dream of skies

                Where fins are wings

                Lily pads are clouds

                Swollen tight

                as seed pearls; gullets

                Safe forever from

                vengeful squid or

                Killer waves.

                Who can say if in their time of death

                Those dreams don’t live

                Bursting skin;
                Trailing comets,

                Scattering scales like stars

                Spilling the pond and soaring limitless

                To be whales

                To be gods

                To be free?

              2. #DreamTherapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

                Bristling – Resistance – Feeling muzzled by day? Do you wake up angry from unrefreshing sleep? Worried? Afraid? Do you gnash your teeth while unconscious? Do you love proving others wrong? When others speak are you eager to jump in and “set them right”? Is your favorite word, “No?”

                Resistance is Never Futile – We woke on this planet for a reason. Its sensible to conclude that self-definition must be key – after all, we can’t make our contribution unless we know who we are. Strangely, we get a lot of push-back on this seemingly basic enterprise. First, enormous cultural pressure: “We have only a few slots available for specific individuals!” Educational advice seems to be: Make yourself one of those Designated Persons no matter who you are, really. It’s enough to gnash anyone’s teeth.

                Challenge – It’s never too late to Get Real. Open your Dream Journal and doodle out the circumstances where you are relaxed, happy, creative and “In-Flow.” That “flow” state is true “bliss” – your brain oozes alpha waves as you sink into an interesting reverie, losing your usual sense of separation from the universe. Suddenly, we experience “Eternity”. Is this achieved for you through music? Dance? Composition? Reading? Sex? Prayer? Some lucky people access this state through meditation alone. It is certainly worth a try; meditation is very good for your brain.

                Danger – The danger is not navel-gazing (micro study can be very revealing) but solipsism. If you are not accessing the universe through your Self, then you are truly Alone, which is a hideous condition (may in fact be Hell.) In our increasingly autocratic world we are becoming very familiar with Aging Babies who expect the rest of us to nursemaid their fussy, immature modality because Growing Up is Ouchy. For God’s sake, for your own sake, for the benefit of the Universe and in hope of Eternity, don’t become one of THOSE. OR one of their enablers.

                Opportunity – Resistance Training Makes Us Stronger. Your whole life, your experiences, your very dreams, have brought you to this moment. Your resistance has blossomed into an individualized focus that must defeat their blander, blunt opposition. You lose nothing – gain everything – by becoming yourself. How? Begin the investigation. What do you like? What do you wish? What fears can you surmount? What do you dream?

                Models & Mentors – ‘When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty” – Thomas Jefferson

                “Every moment of resistance to temptation is a victory”

                – Frederick William Faber

                “To fly we must have resistance” – Maya Lin

                “The history of liberty is a history of resistance”
                – Woodrow Wilson

                “The more important an activity is to your soul’s evolution the more resistance you will feel” – Steven Pressfield

                Mantra – “Self-determined”

                Meditation –

                #Haiku: The Perfect Is the Enemy of the Good

                Static
                “Perfection” is
                Death’s alluring guise;
                Resist:
                Demand
                Birth pangs

              3. #DreamTherapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

                Illusion – Are you captivated by dream world mirages? Do you find yourself dreaming about some magic dissolution of “the rules of reality”?
                The problem with mirages – especially those we long to believe in – is that they become illusions. We need to cling to an obvious fantasy so hard we willingly surrender our ability to discern fact from fiction.

                Illusions are Powerful – The seventeenth century Dutch needed a desirable luxury exchange item the privileged could trade back and forth for status reasons. Yes, that was the tulip bulb. It was a bubble – a scheme with a limited number of buyers – and inevitably the bottom fell out and left a whole lot of previously comfortable people bankrupt. We don’t have anything like that, these days, do we? Or do we?

                Challenge – Are you trapped by an illusion that you used to need but now is killing you? Open your Dream Journal and let’s consider. You can identify this by your increasing suffering over your increasingly difficult life and your diminishing pleasure over something that used to be a reliable joy. Is it as relationship? An activity? A belief? Look at the problem honestly. Find others going through the same experience and have an honest discussion about it. If any group member rushes in defensively to shame and discourage you, to convince you you’re not feeling what you KNOW you ARE then what you’re trying to exit is a cult. Stop communicating with those flying monkeys and find somebody who supports the truth of your actual suffering AND your desire to feel better.

                Danger – The path to re-making yourself is fraught with danger and you will require all sorts of help. Don’t be discouraged if your feelings are volatile and transitory and you are confused about their reality. Move slowly, consulting kind others with whom you feel safe.

                Opportunity – You are embarked on an exciting growth challenge where you leave a constricting carapace behind. Sometimes the “shell” was protective and served for a time to keep you safe while you matured. You don’t need to disparage the old you, or the old relationship; it served its purpose. Often people who have been through a trauma say afterwards they wouldn’t change the past, because they treasure and embrace the person they’ve become.

                Models & Mentors – “Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they’re yours” – Richard Bach

                “The world is an illusion we must take seriously.”
                – Aldous Huxley

                “The light at the end of the tunnel is not an illusion – the tunnel’s the illusion” – Alysse Aallyn

                “Separation from each other is an optical illusion of reality” – Albert Einstein

                ‘Limit, like fear, is often an illusion” – Michael Jordan

                Mantra – “I accept reality”

                Meditation –

                #Haiku: Schism

                In the multiverse
                Heartbreak is
                Mitosis to create
                Extra selves

              4. #DreamTherapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

                Healing Rituals – Are you a believer in magic? Do you dream of restoration, of nostalgia, of lost youth? The world is a garden. In our Garden, just as the light begins to fade, we observe Tea Ceremony. For the last three thousand years, an infusion of yellow chrysanthemum, wolfberry and honey clears anger and stress and quiets heart and brain. The tea is drunk from translucent porcelain cups with delicate gold tracery. Hot water is repeatedly added until the delicious floral scent is gone. Darkness falls, and we bow to one another before departing. If we can bear it, we touch each other’s hands.

                We Cannot Diagnose Ourselves – Healing and diagnosis alike come from the lips of another. It has been scientifically proven that plants respond to kind words. We yearn for the laying on of hands, for the intricate ceremonies that pass us from one stage of life to another.

                Challenge – We CAN heal ourselves – in fact, some would argue that the “medicine” will not work unless we “accept” healing spiritually. We need to feel “worthy” of restoration. What are we punishing ourselves for? Open your Dream Journal and think deeply. They say you are only as “young” as you feel. Are we only as “healthy” as we allow ourselves to be? Forgive yourself. Accept change. Contrary to your fears, change keeps us young.

                Danger – Healing cannot occur in an atmosphere of self-hatred and self-blame, but many of us are STILL “blaming” ourselves for unlucky genetic, social and medical outcomes. “Fundamental attribution error” consists of blaming individuals for group effects. We are all caught up in the machinery of temporality. Never forget that we are souls who happen to have bodies, not bodies who happen to have souls.

                Opportunity – “Restoration” is such a glorious promise that the early Christians found themselves ensnared in decades of argument about PHYSICAL resurrection. How would it work in cases of burning and dismemberment, exactly? It is easy to laugh at these painfully ridiculous theological conflicts. One is reminded of St. Joan of Arc’s response to interrogators at her trial who asked if angels appeared naked – “Do you think God cannot afford to clothe his angels?” Accept the power accorded to you by the universe. Accept the strength of your own mind, the control of your attitude, and step into the Miracle Bath offered you by the world’s oceans.. Healing is not just possible, it is a life-force in which we can all participate. Jesus came to us as a healer.

                Models & Mentors – “Healing yourself is connected with healing others”
                – Yoko Ono

                “What happens when people open their hearts? They get better.”
                – Haruki Murakami

                Your body cannot heal without play. Your mind cannot heal without laughter. Your soul cannot heal without joy.” ~ Catherine Rippinger Fenwick

                “We are healed of suffering only if we experience it to the full – Marcel Proust

                “Maybe the dragons in our lives are princesses”
                – Rainer Maria Rilke

                Mantra – “I heal”

                Meditation:

                #Haiku: Inheritance

                You were born with
                Enough:
                The right to
                Breathe
                Speak
                Learn
                Work
                Eat
                Love
                Heal
                Live