He said he’s been a monk for 20 years and he was jovial and entertaining,
It was a difficult time in my life and the monastery was practically around the corner, I knew it would be quiet and peaceful there, and part of me hoped there’d be something else. Something else that would soothe the ache.
The meditation instruction was simple. Only a handful of beginners attended the session, but his attention was focused on the couple visiting from overseas.
Although he asked for our names, there was no contact in the exchange. 
On the way home I stopped at the local supermarket to pick up some lemons for my morning juice.
The cashier was an elderly African American woman.
“Hi there honey,” she said, looking at me. “How’re you feeling tonight?”
I could tell she was new on the job, I knew most of the cashiers by name.
I asked for her name.
“Mary,” she said, “And what would your name be?
“Julia? Ah my mother’s name was Julia; she was a sweet soul, just like you.”
She saw that I was on the edge of tears, but didn’t say another word. Instead, she pulled out a tissue from the box near the register and handed it to me.
“Good night Julia, you take very good care of yourself, you hear?”
If I keep my eyes open, the whole world can be my ashram and the yellow finch and the stones in the quarry near our home can be the gurus that offer the solace I seek.
Any unexpected gurus crossed your path lately?
Dear Fertile Mamas,
gutsymama, wonderful snowflake and Noddfa, that is quite a change. Good luck with this. FearlessRose, that is great to identify the you don’t deserve orphan and wonderful for adapting and Annabell, beautiful poem about nature as a guru. Chopin, wonderful about the girl taking your hand and thank you so much for the comment about what nourishes and depletes you and wonderful comment about trusting my body completely. Harmonious Life, great for using the orphan to orphan interaction as a chance to develop the visionary with your husband. Braveheart, Wow, expressing yourself in a visionary way with your husband’s family – wonderful and challenging work!
Blessings to all.
Dear Julia and FH friends.
Thank you for the call on Monday. The dream reading we did was interesting for me. I know I would have liked to hop on the bench but a part of me obviously an orphan in hindsight – was ashamed at what the dream revealed to me and didn’t want to be seen by others and she convinced the visionary part of me that she’s right in not hopping on the bench because by revealing my dream reading I would be unfair/disrespectful to my husband.
Two days after the call today – I realize I let the orphan prevail that night. Today the V wants to heal her by sharing the reading which itself will bring healing. So the thoughts that went on when we were reading the dream were – the adult baby was my dear husband. I felt anger/resentment and also a feeling that life wasn’t fair to her. Why did she have to be with a life partner who can sometimes be like that baby. He isn’t like this most of the time – but he can be a bully and it is hard for me to deal with someone who is like that. I also felt bad for not responding to the call of the hour. it showed me that I need to be more compassionate towards him and also towards myself.
This dream maybe showing me if I am denying a certain quality in myself and that is causing the grief. I haven’t found that out yet. So exploration continues.
The UM is telling me through this dream that I may need to have better communication with my husband. Between the two of us he prefers to use fewer words. He has maintained that ‘action speaks louder than words’. And he has always taken a stand that ‘I will believe it when I see it’ rather than ‘I believe it when I hear it’. This has been a point of contention throughout for us and one that has also made me realize the importance of actions – and it has taken me rather long to realize it. But I am not going to chastise myself for taking so long to understand this, but celebrate that I finally get it. Words can only take us so far. Without actually doing the actions we lack the experience and the real transformation is through experience (this I am learning from the book from Dr.Gerald Epstein that I am continuing to read). So actions are indeed very important. Maybe the baby boy was showing me that the ‘action’ part of my life is crying to be heard and wanting for attention. Like Julia pointed out in her own reading of the dream.
Thank you Brave Caterpillar for sharing this beautiful dream!
Thank you to all FH friends who hopped on the bench, with some of whom I shared the May workshop. And thank you to all the friends who are sharing their insights on the blog.
Love.
xxxx
p.s. Off I go for my morning imagery :)
I wanted to share one more “guru”. My sister was throwing a baby shower at her house this past weekend for a friend I did not know. Usually she will not even mention a shower to me thinking it might upset me. However she told me of this friend. She said her friend was 43 going to be 44 in december and is due next month with a healthy baby. She conceived him naturally. It does happen. It will happen. I said the last call I believe my heart is finally catching up with my body. I feel that now.
The guru that I listened to recently, when I had to make a life changing decision was my body.
I had to choose between a path that leads me either away from or back towards my husband. My body voted strongly for the first, though it has been deeply painful to take this path.
All of the support that I have gained from Fertile Heart has made me clear that I am enough and can have a great life whether or not I have children, they are longed for and there is so much space in my life for them, but I cannot make parenthood a precondition for happiness, for myself or my marriage.
Thank you all for the strength you have given me to leap into the unknown.
Xxxx
Dear Julia,
Thank you for this heartwarming blog – it reminds me so much that there is a guru and kind-heartedness in all of us. In a time when hatred seems to be permeating our lives so much, this is a good thing to remember. My gurus are you! and the FH ladies on our calls and on your blog. Also, my yoga teacher who does not say much to me personally, but he oozes calmness and kindness. I feel so much more balanced (or maybe the word is ‘grounded’) and “able” after my daily imagery and body truths – and when I go to my yoga class, I add even more to a sense of hope in me. I can feel how I am now ‘bowing to what is’ in many more ways than I thought I would – sometimes it is a bit unexpected as I find myself walking into a situation and adapting to it, rather than complaining about, as I might have done a year ago. Thank you for helping me find this inner strength!!
As to your question about any unexpected gurus having crossed my path recently, well – maybe I can see my daughter as my unexpected guru. She is a bundle of “taking it as it is” and she enjoys every thing that she experiences. She tells me when she is scared, so I cuddle her and tell her it is ok to be scared and it will be ok as she is a strong, kind and independent wee girl. She somehow always knows when to give me a hug and we have a lot of fun in the park these days (football and bubbles!), so I am counting my blessings at the moment!!
At the moment, I have been doing Field of Creation and Ladder of Light, together with Welcome Home and Defend/Receive and Elbows First. I have had rather a lot of Os appearing who think I do not deserve a second baby – so I am listening to them and trying to give them love and a space to tell me what else is on their hearts. It has been a bit tough at times to realise that I have Orphans who say such cruel things, such as ‘you don’t deserve another baby as you are not a good mother because you need to go to work again” – so I have found a bit of a guilt Orphan there, too. I am happy to listen, even if it is painful. It is all part of my journey!
I am looking forward to our call tonight!!
Love, FearlessRose
A beautiful post. My 3 unexpected gurus in the last week or so have been:
1.The woman who I hardly know who posted such a warm and loving message on my Facebook wall for my birthday. It really touched me. And her warmth (my natural tendency is to hold back more) encouraged me to reach out to another woman I don’t know well who’s been having a hard time as she’s breaking up with her husband, and I wrote her a warm and supportive message, for which she was very grateful. From these encounters I’ve learnt that I want to try and be less cautious, less worried about expressing what’s in my heart for fear that I’m being too intimate with people or exposing myself too much. To remember that most of us long for more not less warmth, and that when we receive it, it deeply touches us.
2. On a similar note, this past week I also received a huge amount of support from a woman I’ve never actually met. I was having a pretty rough week and she was generous enough to speak to me on the phone for an hour and share her story – and its happy ending :-)- as well as offer so much wisdom and support. One of the definitions of guru that I’ve come across is someone who can transform darkness into light, and at the end of our conversation I could definitely sense some light having been shed across my rather dark landscape.
3. And finally, nature. Always a guru. It is impossible not to feel at least a bit better – and sometimes entirely shifted! – when I walk through the park (or get out of the city into the landscape). At the moment the park is exquisite, with everything in full bloom, the air filled with the fragrances of flowers and leaves, the birds swimming and strolling by the lake. It reminds me that we are somehow part of something much bigger than just our thoughts and concerns. In fact, I’m going to share one of my favourite poems, which I find very soothing:
The Peace of Wild Things BY WENDELL BERRY
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Dear AnnabelL.
Belated birthday wishes to you! I am also born in July and had my b’day last week. Thank you for sharing your experience of the unexpected gurus.
The poem you shared is quite something. Thank you for sharing it.
Thank you!!
Dear Julia,
thank you for this post. It makes me think of how little we trust what’s right in front of our face and how much we invest into something that is far and promising. I have a wonderful memory from early June, when a little girl was my guru. A father and a little girl were playing on the beach as I walked by. Suddenly the girl walked up to me, holding up her hand, so I took her hand and she walked with me a little ways. Her father and I looked at each other with surprise and wonder. Even writing about the memory I am so touched and remember how touched I was then. I was a total stranger to her and she reached out her hand to me so matter of factly, as though we had known each other forever.
Thank you for writing about this encounter. Thank you and the ladies on the call each time for being there and listening to me. I enjoy every time you recognize my voice. Your voice has been very soothing to me as I find my own voice to speak up for myself.
Dear friends, and Julia.
This is another eye-opening post that reveals a lot as days go by and I let the question seep deeper in me.
Many many congratulations to you MiraculousLife on your little bundle of joy! You are truly an inspiration and your commitment is exemplary. Thank you for patiently being there and checking in on the blog and forum.
Thank you Butterfly faith for your kind words. Just as you said, I experience gratitude for FH sisters right here. You are the gurus for me too. When J said that she does her imagery thrice a day consistently, and Brave Caterpillar says she juices regularly and plans her groceries better, you give me ideas on how to nourish myself and to take care of myself.
I have been doing ‘Tree of Faith and Surrender’ which is exactly what i needed at this point. I also read an intriguing book over the weekend which was also about a tree and a boy who is fourteen – the Eagle Tree. After I read that book my imagery has brought new meaning. It is helping me connect with the tree better. We went for a short hike on Monday and I had some moments of solitude with nature and the trees, and I was thinking of the imagery and telling myself that every tree I see could be the tree of faith and surrender, and every step I take on the stroll is taking me one step closer to meeting my child half way. it felt good to look at nature this way.
So these are my two gurus recently – books and nature. I want to mention two other gurus – first is the Ultimate Mom, who is really the God/Almighty, the guiding voice inside of me. The voice who led me to FH practice, like ML said. This is the voice who is ever present, compassionate and patiently waiting for me to listen to her. Also my husband has been my guru in a surprising way. Our interactions help me understand when we are having an orphan to orphan dialogue and more recently I have started to pay attention to his words as a visionary and not as an orphan. His words reflect his reality and maybe his truth, but that need not be my reality and that’s okay. I need to follow my trail of truth and only pick what I think I may need for my journey to help me stay the course. Some of the things he says are hurtful to me and earlier I used to only feel the hurt, but the visionary in me is able to use those words/emotions as a fuel for action and that’s a good change.
I also started reading another book that I think would complement Fertile Female very well is “Healing Into Immortality: A New Spiritual Medicine of Healing Stories and Imagery” by Gerald Epstein. I am only 25% of the way in this book but it is resonating with me. The key idea so far is that “Belief creates experience”, and not “experience creates belief”. Which really is analogous to what Julia says that we are co-creators of our lives.
Looking forward to connecting with you all next week.
Love.
xxxx
Dear Julia, Dear Fertileheart Mamas,
Thank you very much for your inspiring comments and thoughts which I read and read again with great interest and lots of emotions. I wasn’t very well over the previous two weeks due to issues we’re facing with my husband’s family (the last two months intesively and, overall, since I’ve met him), plus the fact that the only egg I produced last week with natural cicle proved to be full of water. One more month of trying. However, I’ve doing systematicaly ‘field of creation’, which really helped me a lot, since I could see a new self coming up in the image, a self that feels and realizes what is better for me and dares to express this with words and actions, instead of being angry and feel the bitterness inside her. My guru today was my spiritual father in the local church. I talked to him about my feelings, about the fact that I keep hidding my bitterness about my husband’s family, taking all the responsibility and pretending that all is well because this makes him happy at the end. I mentioned also that I imagine a new self, one that feels free to express with words and actions my emotions, without insulting others, but with respect for myself. He gave me his blessings and I felt great relief and for the first maybe time in my life freedom to do what is important for me. A new self has just be born.
I look forward to connecting with you during that call tonight.
Blessings to you all.
Dear Wonderful Fertile Mamas,
butterflyfaith, I also feel the Mamas here are gurus.
I have been continuing with Mirror of Truth Fertile Heart imagery and Elbows First Fertile Heart body truth.
I have also been looking at what nourishes me and what depletes me physically and emotionally/spiritually and asked my husband the same thing. My husband says he gets depleted physically from lots to do and physically and emotionally nourished from walks and hiking. We both get spiritually/emotionally depleted from my daughter’s emotional challenges. I feel nourished physically with juicing and spiritually when I connect with my body through yoga or some other body work and when I am able to teach children in our religions group. Not enough sleep is still something I am working on that is physically depleting.
I am very grateful my husband was willing to discuss those questions with me. Actually, that is spiritually and emotionally nourishing for me, when he joins with me and we can talk like that and he takes it seriously.
My daughter is better this week so far. I am grateful for that. Also I became aware of someone using an example of how holding up a drinking cup half filled with water is no big deal for a few minutes, but holding it up all day can be immobilizing and debilitating, so I’m trying to assess whether what I am concerned about at any given moment is a water cup orphan that just needs to be put down or an orphan that needs serious healthy attention.
Blessings to all
I
Dear Gravid Sans Doute,
I love how you look for what nourishes and depletes you and how were able to find intimacy with your husband talking about this. I connect to the feeling of being able to discuss how one feels and feeling recognized as a person. Your comment inspired me to wonder what nourishes and depletes me, it is a question I never asked myself, only always felt nourished or depleted without recognizing why or what was the cause for me. Thank you for sharing this wonderful story. I am happy to hear your daughter is doing better.
I used to see “signs” and gurus everywhere. It almost felt surreal. Then life got complicated (more complicated, I should say), and I moved to Orphanland and things just didn’t look as clear. I felt left on my own, without any guidance.
But then I found FH and all of you. YOU mamas are my gurus. I never really realized it until now, but now it’s crystal clear. I turn to this website and these blogs often, and for awhile I thought it was just an easy distraction from actually doing the work. While sometimes it may be, more often than not I come here to get guidance and nourishment from you. I receive an encouraging high-five from GSD, I get nourishing prose from Heather, I connect nearly word for word with Sparxy and gutsymama, I get incredibly inspired by ML, I get excited by the passion of HL . And so many, many more. Your stories, triumphs, frustrations, struggles, victories. All of this you offer here, and through all of this you mamas become gurus, guiding me and others down this road.
Far too often I find myself, as Julia talked about in a previous blog, so fired up in proclaiming my post in Orphanland, demanding that everyone agree with me that this is the ONLY path and I’m doomed to walk it. And then I get pissed off when no one agrees with me. But I’m terrified someone will. So then I turn here. While we are not a bunch of Pollyannas, we also don’t just scream and thrash and raise a fist to the sky shrieking “Screw you!” (Even though we may want to). We are more than that. You guys show me that every single time I come here. So thank you. I need that. I’m kind of in a plateau phase right now. Like the kid who lost 40 pounds and has 10 more to go, but is desperately stuck. I’m feeling in a rut, and tired, and wanting to grab that big old carton of ice cream and chow down.
Instead, like any dieter knows, I have to not say “fu** it,” but actually kick up my workouts and throw this baby into high gear. That’s how I will turn this bend. And you gurus are my personal trainers, gently getting me off the couch and back on the bike.
Love to you all. Thank you for being here, and thank you Julia for always watching over us, guiding us and loving us.
Dear Fertile Mamas,
Miraculouslife what a wonderful vision with your baby and congratulation! I love that you were sitting in the same place imagining your baby and now your baby is in your arms. I also like being open for guidance from many sources. Wonderful heather1975teaching that you are learning from your son as well and sharing the life you have with him now. gutsymama, great for radical trust in life.
I have been working with Mirror of Truth and visualizing 25 and also Elbows First Fertile Heart body truth.
The last few days have been a challenging time with my daughter. She goes through emotional things sometimes where it is kind of like caring for a child who has the flu – you just have to get the medical help you need and bow to what is. My worry orphan has been interfering with my best sleep intentions, but I so appreciate the guidance.
I do appreciate, Julia, your being a guru – someone to guide me through feelings and not be so controlled by them or afraid of them. I also have to say my daughter’s therapist has been a guru to us – helping my husband and I when we didn’t have any idea what to do and helping us formulate a plan in often very creative ways – he has also helped to maintain a healthy sense of humor and helped us to see it, too, when things seemed too serious to ever smile.
Blessings to all
I love seeing Heather and ML’s names here! My first phone circle! Love you all and so happy to seeing you meet your children! ML I love you put 3 years in there bc I am rounding out year 3 but it is this past year really where I feel like things are healing in a very deep way.
Another random unexpected gurus yesterday happened. I was going for a run down a quiet street. I have been becoming more and more active and in a way running for me is a body truth. I can think and almost visualize as I run. I am still not quite in shape like I was a few years ago but as I ran I thought “just keep going this is a visionary action and it doesnt have to be perfect” and again I asked the UM to help me gain the radical trust in life I so long and after thinking this I hear a car slowing down and a woman yells to me “great work! keep going you can do it”. It was great. I needed a little boost and she randomly gave it to me. I have been afraid to let go of things and not control every little event in my life. In baby making though there can be no control on my end. I need to let things go and continue to ask for what I want and follow every visionary action I feel aligns with me.
I was just thinking about our dear ML and when I opened up this link, there she was. Like her my little one was feeding and I became overwhelmed with this sense of gratitude and joy. There is not a day that goes by when I don’t feel gratitude or blessings, even the ones filled with teething tears, poopy diapers and 3am wake up calls.My little man has been my guru to a certain extent. He shows joy when he discovers he can untie my shoelace and tries a new food or gets tickled in his favorite spot. It’s joy in the little things. He is also teaching me patience, like when we watch Frozen for the 314st time because he loves the songs or when he wakes up crying and is inconsolable. He reminds me that sometimes patience can be the biggest struggle. I still work on this as I work with my body child when she is frustrated about our cycles or when my orphans pop up. But like out dear ML,I am flooded with gratitude when I use my FH tools or reflect on my ongoing pilgrimage and delve into the work with my orphan. Julia, you too continue to be my guru.In my past I would have just shut down or gone into a filmy haze of denial when my orphans popped up, now I work with them and open up to the process and say what is my next guide post what have I learned? Blessings to you all. Thank you Julia! My journey continues and I am grateful for it.
Beautiful MiraculousLife, and WarriorBeagle and RaeSF, and lovely Heather and all the awesome, awesome Fertile Heart Moms who come by and keep in touch, I am so happy to get all your pictures and think of you with your babies.
Dear MiraculousLife, if I ever feel in need of validation (happens from time to time) all I have to do is search for your comments. Your generous heart has always been and continues to be a gift to all of us in this stunning community.
Thank you so much Julia & you are most welcome !! I owe so much to you in my life. Things that I was ashamed of once upon a time like late pregnancy, yrs of marriage life, difficulty conceiving, age factor etc have now turned into V voice. I am in fact proud of my life, my body. And this is a huge shift in my thinking & I can see & sense how good it feels when I come out strongly from V place. As mentioned in your blog, when in need of guidance, I tend to sense that I receive messages from various sources – facebook, emails, whatsapp messages, conversations, fertile heart blogs, forum posts. All I need to do is be as much open to receive the guidance as possible – as mentioned in your introduction CD.
Beautiful post Julia ! I wanted to comment on couple of other posts, especially the one that spoke about what was it like “Bowing to what is and letting go”. Today as I was feeding my little one sitting down on my couch, tears came out involuntarily. It was the same exact spot where I cried inconsolably for years not knowing if I will ever be blessed with a child, it was the same very spot where I sat down to attend all the fertileheart support calls for 3 yrs, where i practiced my imagery ardently sitting in the same exact spot – doing “Meeting my child halfway” and seeing myself fondling my baby and lo and behold, my imagery came to life, I am fondling my miracle baby in reality, my dream and my longing for a child has come true.
I am just flooding with gratitude and can’t thank enough for the guidance I got from GOD – my first & foremost unseen yet extremely powerful GURU, who’s presence I can sense every now and then – who introduced me to Fertileheart and the angel – JULIA INDICHOVA :) !!!
Thank you Julia for introducing me to my most intimate, unknown, hidden orphans and ways to understand and allow them to be healed in the most appropriate way;
I thank the fertileheart OVUM tools for allowing me to realize that LIFE always unfolds in the right way and I just needed to trust it and go with it and not fight against the current of life. things might not follow my calendar and timetable, but believing in the mystery that life holds and bowing down to it was the best thing that I ever learnt (& will keep on learning. Thank you for making me realize that the best GURU in this world is LIFE.
I was introspecting how I reacted to few events in the past and realized that had I put enough faith in what LIFE holds, I wouldn’t have behaved so insanely/foolishly. Easy to say, but something that I observed through my journey. Hopefully I will put that into practice and will follow what my Guru,”LIFE” has to offer.
Beautifully said ML! Such lovely and heartfelt sentiment, so glad to have “met ” your lovely soul on this journey. I still light a candle for you at church and think of you so often!
Dear Heather
Thank you so very much!!
I met most beautiful souls in this journey through FH.
Dear Gm (K)
so glad to hear from you too. Like you, the wholevpractice really went to a different level in year3. i could clearly feel the shift. My body, my dreams & waking life were my gurus in yr 3 apart from the guiding angel – Julia
I wish you the very best wholeheartedly & will keep praying for you. Feels so good to connect with you all again. MH
Dear miraculous life,
I can hear you when you write that year 3 of your practice has been a shift to a new level. Sometimes, I feel ashamed of being in the circles for ‘so long’, but then I realize that my whole person and life has been much more trusting and open and less scared of life since the year 3. I will share with you a quote from an actor I read in an interview with recently that resonated with me. He is describing his acting style: “I like using my body, I trust it completely…” This sentence jumped out at me, so he was my guru this week. I brought this close to my heart and know that is a part of my story, to trust my body completely. And I have to say that it feels as if I became aware of my body since I started the practice. Before it was locked up in a chamber. This week I have been doing Welcome Home body truth and Grand Hall of Acceptance. Sometimes I do the practice and fall asleep during it, but that is ok sometimes. It prevents me from being too serious with it. Have you felt similarly about it or you don’t have the ‘lets take this seriously orphan’, who is rigid in terms of anything, and life cannot unravel. I’d be happy to talk about this tonight, if people want to hear