_________________________________________________________________________________

To see the full newsletter in its original format, click here.
_________________________________________________________________________________

Sunday, Jan. 29, 2006 — Sedona, Arizona

Letter from Mark David

Tis the song, the sigh of the weary,
Hard times, hard times,
Come again no more
Many days you have lingered
Around my cabin door;
Oh hard times come again no more
— Stephen Foster, 1855


Dear Friends of the Light,

These are intense times. There’s no way around that, and there’s no other way to describe it.

They’re intense, and that intensity is not going to ease up soon.

They’re intense because we are rocketing into fuller awarenesses and expressions of our highest vibrations and potential...because we are accelerating into the New Earth, an energy that has always existed, waiting patiently for us to be ready to acknowledge it and live it.

As we do that, anything and everything not aligned with ascension energy is thrust into our face to be transformed and redeemed.

We’re accelerating/ascending from level to level like an elevator on some combination of uppers and steroids.

This elevator is not like the one in your downtown office tower, moving gently and steadily from floor to floor.

No, it speeds up, then suddenly jerks to a stop, sometimes for moments, sometimes for days...sometimes between floors, leaving you no apparent way out.

Then without warning and in an bone-rattling burst, it propels you upward, only to plummet into underground parking before skyrocketing back to the penthouse and beyond.

Yes, it’s wearying. Yes, as Stephen Foster so movingly put it 150 years ago, it feels in moments like hard times you would wish to expel from your life.

Here’s the deal: You’re experiencing the same growing pains you did as a kid, only now they transcend the physical. In the true sense of the word, they’re metaphysical, moving beyond what’s going on in your body to encompass the mental, emotional and spiritual.

That’s not to say you’re not experiencing them physically. These days, any of the following symptoms relate as much, if not more, to your ascension to New Earth awareness as they do to old-fashioned aches ‘n pains: cold/flu-like symptoms, headaches, dizziness/light-headedness, digestive distress, sore joints, ringing in the ears, blurry vision, sore eyes, excessive mucous, fatigue, insomnia, throat irritation and a reawakening of stress points you thought were long ago healed.

Every aspect of your beingness is shifting, changing, transforming, altering to accommodate who you are becoming and where you are going.

At this point in your life and mine, we are walking between the worlds. With one foot still in 3D and another in higher dimensions of awareness, you are walking a disconcerting, discomfiting, disorienting tightrope whose start and end points remain invisible to the human eye.

In my novel, The MoonQuest, there’s a scene where the young protagonist, Toshar, finds himself on what I can only describe as a skyway.

“I quickly learned,” Toshar recalls of his unsettling journey, “to train my eyes to look no more than a few paces ahead. At that distance, a faint, silvery glow marked out my path. It was almost opaque. Yet if I looked back or farther ahead, I saw no sign of road, no sign of anything.”

Like Toshar’s, our walk between the worlds can be stressful and intense.

Yet there are ways to ease that walk. One, as Toshar discovered, is to stay as firmly grounded in the present moment as possible.

Toshar didn’t have much of a choice. The road he was on formed only as he stepped forward.

In a sense, we are walking that same skyway. We may think we see what’s ahead. But that vision of the future, like so much else these days, is little more than illusion.

Only by focusing on the now can we be assured of peace of mind, can we ease our tightrope walk between the worlds.

Another way to ease that walk is it know that we’re being taken care of. This knowingness may begin with belief, but must ultimately transcend it if, once again, we’re going to have any measure of peace.

On this walk between the worlds, we’re called upon to open to the voice of the heart, which is the voice of our highest truth. We're called upon to surrender to, trust and act on that voice, knowing that in so doing we’ll be taken care of...even if not always in the ways our smaller selves would choose or prefer.

Acting from that place of knowingness is guaranteed to ease the walk.

So is finding the joy in every moment

Again, our walk between the worlds can be stressful and intense. It can also be joyful and exhilarating.

Joy and exhilaration are choices, as are panic and despair.

Each of life’s moments presents us with choices. It’s then up to us to choose the attitudes, behaviors and responses that will support our walk....that will ease our walk...that will lighten our step regardless of external circumstances. We make those choices to the best of our ability in each of those moments — with compassion, love and forgiveness toward ourselves when we fall short of the mark.

I know you can do it. I know it because I see the light of your mastery radiating out across the miles. I know it because I see the truth of your beingness pushing through the dross of everyday life.

I know it because I know who you are. And I believe in you...in those moments when you believe in yourself and, most especially, in those moments when you can’t.

Namaste,
Mark David

Thursday’s New Earth Initiation Teleconference (Feb. 2) is designed specifically to help you ease your walk between the worlds. Offering practical tools, inspired guidance and energetic assistance, it’s the perfect palliative to the intensity of the times. Please join us if you can. (For more about New Earth Initiations, please see below.)



The Way of the Buffalo: Notes Toward a New Earth

As many of you know, when I left my Sedona home in December 2004, I began an odyssey I never expected to last more than a few months.

Now, 55 weeks and 42,000 miles later, having crossed the United States twice and worked with many of you in person, Santa Fe, New Mexico has called on me to drop anchor.

Dropping anchor isn’t the same as planting roots.

When we uproot a tree and replant it in new soil, there’s always a risk it will not take to its new environment. There’s always a risk it will die.

When we raise anchor, it’s but the start of another phase of an ongoing journey.

I will be in Santa Fe as long as it’s right to be there. And when it’s time to set sail anew, I will raise anchor and allow the breath of God to carry me to the next port.

I can’t yet know why Santa Fe is calling or what awaits me there (any more than I could know what leaving Sedona would mean). All I can do is surrender to the voice of my heart, trust its guidance and know that despite my human fears, I will be taken care of.

Yet whether I’m in on the road, in Santa Fe or someplace else altogether, the Way of the Buffalo continues.

For the Way of the Buffalo is not restricted to the road. The Way of the Buffalo is the way of ascension, the way of mastery, the way of the light...the way of the New Earth into which we are all moving.

And so these chronicles continue, in this moment...for there is truly no other.


January 17-23, 2006 — Santa Fe, New Mexico

• January 17 — I left Santa Fe yesterday, yet find myself back today after a single night in Raton, a few hours north. I left, feeling called to Capulin Mountain, an extinct volcano near the Colorado border. Part of the draw, or so I think, is the road that spirals up the volcano to its crater and summit. Once at Capulin, though, I discover that snowdrifts have barred the way up. Disappointed, I settle into the 51st State of the Union, the State of Confusion. It’s a state I know better than any in the Lower 48. Confusion holds me in its thrall until it’s too late to go just about anywhere but back to Santa Fe. So here I am...

• January 18 — On this sunny afternoon, I take an exploratory drive around Glorieta Pass southeast of here. Known as the Gettysburg of the West, for here’s where the decisive western battle of the Civil War was fought, Glorieta carries none of the troubling Gettysburg energies. Here, the feeling is open, welcoming, expansive...solid. Glorieta, to my dismay, has nothing to do with glory. It’s Spanish for square, a word that doesn’t at first carry the magic of this southernmost tip of the Sangre de Christo Mountains. Yet as I drive up and over the mesa, I realize that square is perfect. It reflects the focused solidity I’m feeling...the foundational energy here that I find powerfully magnetic, supportive and grounding.

• January 19 — Today is the day I’m calling the Aquarian Earth Gateway, a day that is the New Year of the New Earth, a day that energetically lays the foundation for all that will open and emerge through 2006. It’s also the day I wake up and surrender to making Santa Fe my home base. As I do this I remind Santa Fe of the list I made a few days ago (see 01/17/06 Newsletter) and insist that if Santa Fe wants me, it had better provide for me. I don’t make the connection between my surrender and the day’s energy until moments before the evening’s teleconference, my first ever from Santa Fe. When I do, I smile at the unconscious synchronicity. ... Glorieta becomes the foundation for tonight’s teleconference, so much so that an hour before the call, I feel compelled to draw it.

• January 20 — Something about the energy of the gateway, the energy of my Santa Fe declaration and the energy of the teleconference has come together. I’m ready to look for a place to live here. Apparently, Santa Fe is ready too. The first place I check out feels promising (and meets nearly every criterion on my Jan. 11 list), even as it pushes some financial buttons.

• January 21 — My strange time at Capulin is redeemed by my energy drawing — a powerful representation of the path to inner truth and enlightenment.

• January 22 — I look at two more places but neither feels right. “I deserve more,” I state as I reject both in favor of the first place I saw. More financial buttons get pushed when I’m encouraged (by both my prospective landlord and Spirit) to pay two months’ rent up front. If you don’t release the funds, they can’t be replaced and added to, I hear — from Spirit, not my landlord. I squirm...and surrender yet again. Unless the legendary coyote (trickster) energy of the Southwest kicks in, I move in on the 30th.

• January 23 — I commit to my new Santa Fe domicile for two months and as soon as I hand over a check for half, the rental agent becomes the fifth person in two weeks to ask who created my web site. “I did,” I reply, at which point she she asks if I’d want to set up simple sites for some of her clients...and suddenly, Santa Fe is supporting me financially in a way I could never have imagined. Once again, I’m reminded that my biggest job is to hold the resonance that I am always taken care of and to release all attachment and expectation around what that looks like.

(If you like my web site and would like me to create one like it for you, e-mail me for details.)


January 25, 2006 — Sedona, Arizona

“What’s next?” I ask in my continuing dialog with the energy of Santa Fe. “Commitment,” I hear in reply.

However illusory they are, 3D legalities can carry powerful symbolic force.

When I met my ex-wife seven years ago, for example, I knew it was important for us to get married...even though until that moment I had never considered the legality of marriage as an important step. When the marriage ended, divorce carried the same power and significance.

Even though I have had no conventional/physical home for the past 55 weeks, Sedona has remained the legal residence required of me by so many institutions and agencies.

Today, Santa Fe informs me that its next level of commitment to me depends on mine to it. And so even though nonrefundable months remain on my Arizona identity, it’s time to commit to New Mexico through whatever symbolism is available to me: new mailing address, new driver’s license, new plates for the car. It’s time to step through the portal and claim my new life.


A Word About My Teleconferences

As I was driving up and over Glorieta Mesa (pictured to the right) near Santa Fe last week, thinking about the teleconference scheduled for the following evening, it occurred to me that all these calls carry the Glorieta energy in that they are foundational, grounding and supportive. (see, The Way of the Buffalo, January 18)

In fact, the phrase that came to me was virtual sanctuary.

That’s what these group teleconference calls truly are, a virtual sanctuary, a safe, supportive, secure space into which you can retreat from the stresses and trials of everyday life, from the stresses and trials of an Ascension life, and find peace, support and like, Glorieta, a foundation for whatever is next.

And yet, glorieta is also Spanish for town square or plaza, a very public place. That’s a reminder that even as we retreat into our sanctuary, this journey is not about hiding. It’s about carrying our light, refreshed and renewed, back out into the world, onto the town square, the plaza, the open space.

So invite you to join me in this sanctuary experience, a sanctuary that we co-create through our energy, our intention and our beingness, a sanctuary that connects us all in common purpose and prepares us to step back out into the world as the radiant lights that we each and all are.


What Happens During an Initiation?

Whether one-on-one or in a group, whether over the phone or in person, a New Earth Initiation combines practical spiritual guidance, DNA activation and light-language singing — in a meditative yet grounding form.

This blending of elements is designed to awaken your highest potential, activate your mastery and propel you forward to your next level, whatever that is for you.

At a practical level, a New Earth Initiation can eliminate pain and blockages of all sorts, freeing you in this life to live joyfully, passionately and creatively in the highest expression of your Divine purpose and desire.

Wherever you are in your life, an Initiation will accelerate your spiritual journey and align you with the New Earth now birthing within you.


What is the “New Earth”?

There are many ways to answer that question — metaphysically, spiritually, religiously, developmentally.

Some talk about it in terms of living at a higher frequency, resonance or vibration. Others speak of coming into a conscious awareness of our multidimensional nature.

Jesus spoke of Kingdom of God. Heaven on Earth is another popular term, so is the notion of moving into light body or God realization.

However you look at it, we are evolving as a human race.

Where that is leading us and how/what we’ll be when we get there remain beyond our human understanding. And any information we receive can only be tuned to whatever our still-limited minds can grasp.

So, for me, it’s more important to focus on the practical benefits of the New Earth that are available for you in your life right now. The most basic is the ability to live with greater ease, in greater flow, as greater love, in greater compassion, at greater peace, in fuller surrender and in deeper trust.

In those moments you achieve that, you are in the New Earth, already experiencing its benefits. And as you link more of those moments into hours, days, weeks and months, time collapses, struggle dissolves and Heaven and Earth are one in your life.

All the work I do — through Initiations, through my writing, through public talks, through these newsletters — is designed to open you to more of those moments.

When we’re all there more of the time, we’ll all discover that the New Earth is beyond anything we could ever have imagined.


The MoonQuest: A Story for Our Time

This excerpt is from the latest free installment of my novel, now available on this web site...

A bell-like soprano ripples through the night in cascades of colored light.

"What is truer than true and stronger than strong?

"What is brighter than bright when sung sweetly as song?

"What rises within and must call out or die?

"Why is darkness so dark?

"Why do tears streak the sky?”

I see the music slide away like raindrops down a windowpane. Silence. Again.

"Why is darkness so dark? Why do tears streak the sky?” The lines repeat with insistent urgency.

"Stories,” I say slowly, as though spelling out the word. "There are no more stories?”

"But there are, young bard-in-becoming. You know them all, even those you do not yet know. Complete the song, Toshar. Complete the song.” Again the words whisper through the air: "Why is darkness so dark? Why do tears streak the sky?”

I don't know what to say. I've never heard this song before. Or have I? I feel music swell up inside, a delicate carillon that spills effortlessly from me.

"Stories are truer than fact, stronger than fear

"They rise from the soul, bursting forth in song clear

"Our tales feed the moon, her tears they do dry

"There's but one that can save her, and that one is —”

I'm coughing, choking, even as the music continues expectantly.

"How does it end, Toshar? How does it end?” The tapping jabs at each word. "How does it end?”

"I-I don't know.”

"Do not lie to me.” I feel the growling rage in the pit of my stomach. "You cannot lie to me. FINISH THE SONG.”

"I-I can't.” I'm crying, shaking uncontrollably. "I can't. I can't. I can't.” Each "I can't” wracks through my body with a violent shudder. "I daren't,” I whisper.

"I'll sing it with you.” The heart-link softens to a reassuring purr. "We'll sing it together.

"Stories are truer than fact, stronger than fear

"They rise from the soul, bursting forth in song clear

"Our tales feed the moon, her tears they do dry

"There's but one that can save her, and that one —

"And that one, Toshar? And that one?”

"Is I,” I whisper hoarsely.

_________________________________________________________________________________

(c) 2006 Mark David Gerson. All rights reserved. This material may be freely shared and reproduced as long as it is for personal use, no fee is charge for viewing/reading it, and this copyright and contact information is included. Any other use requires permission from the author. To subscribe or contact the author, click here.