Enacting Consciousness
Ascending Dimensions
Rising Up
Igniting Creativity
Grounding Down
Ancient wisdom meets quantum physics in this fascinating 9-session course.
Imagination meets spiritual connection in this enlightening 11-session course.
Retreat from routine with an easy art project and soothing cup of tea in this carefree 2-hour session.
Who we are and how we found Thrivival.
How to connect with us.
Symbolized by the tetrahedron, aligned with the sacral chakra, and governing the universal Law of Gender, Fire ignites our powers of creativity.
Expressed through art and sexuality, Fire inspires us to engage our imaginations with passionate enthusiasm.
Like light, creativity, and communication, fire is a contagious energy that ignites collective values and embodies abundance by expanding through sharing. Fire gathers us to warmth and companionship. It soothes and mesmerizes us, in dancing flourishes of flame and swirling smoke.
To our ancestors, at the centre of every camp and village, fire gave warmth in the coldness, light in the darkness, and nourishing sustenance daily. Most importantly, fire invoked the great, intangible lesson that sharing it by extending it to others, rather than diminishing the quantity or quality of the fire, actually created more and ensured that the vital resource would not be extinguished.
What to do when the historical details I need are not readily accessible? Allow my current inability to check historical facts to bring my story to a screeching halt just as it was starting to pick up momentum? Or plough ahead, imaginatively filling in the gaps as best I can, with the intention of editing for accuracy later?
Occasionally, I half-awaken around 3am and toss-and-turn as my mind churns over creative solutions to my next chapter’s dilemma. Sometimes, the solutions still sound inspired in the morning and sometimes they fall flat.
Situated in the Magic Realism genre, I wrote this short story in 1999. It was inspired by the foreboding inscription over the entrance to a gated cemetery in Catanduva, Brazil, the town in which I lived as an exchange student in 1990-1991.
The post “Forethought” marks the beginning of the story “Death by Water”, within the story “Life by Drowning”, to which I alluded when I called this a “multi-dimensional novel”. Although Gisa Catarina Gärtner and the Gärtner family is fictional, the setting is real and the historical details are accurate to the best of my knowledge. Here are some background details.
Gisa Catarina Gärtner was born at sea on October 5, 1933, halfway between the province of Tirol, Austria, and the state of Santa Catarina, Brazil, thereby becoming the youngest of 91 Catholic Austrian emigrants headed to found a new colony in the New World.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009: My curiosity over the letter’s origin turns to obsession. Who could have written such a letter and under what circumstances? The question rests on my pillow, and the letter under it, as I drift off to sleep that night.
Monday, July 20, 2009: In the days that follow, I carry the mysterious letter with me everywhere, pausing often to re-read it and re-examine the envelope.
