You can take the girl out of boulder...

but you can't take the boulder out of the girl.

I was born and raised in NY. I lived there until 18 and around age 16 I knew I didn't like the people or anything about the east coast and pretty much told my parents I was going to college out west. They put a 1000 mile radius around their house and of course I ignored it and went to boulder.

I reazlied this week that I have not lived on the east coast in my adult life. I have lived out west since I was 18 and I'm such a west coast person or a western US person. I mean I've been drinking soy milk since I was 18, and going to Afalfas and Wild Oats before anyone had ever heard of Whole Foods or Trader Joes and certainly before it became a thing. I was eating Quinoa before I could legally drink (not that that stopped me of course) It was just the way of life inboulder, that's what everyone did, eat crazy well, work out all the time and enjoyed being chill.

I like the western way of life, wide open spaces, the sun, the relaxed attitude of all it's residents.

I have a point...
Last night I went to this thing called a sweat lodge. It's a native American tradition where you sit in a teeppe type structure that is covered in tarps and hot stones are brought it in and you sit there and chant and pray to the Great Spirit and think about how enlightened you are... and you sweat and sweat and sweat and sweat... i mean I have NEVER IN MY LIFE sweat so much. I drank 3 liters of water throughout the 2.5 hour thing and i peed once last night whenI got home! I mean, sweat just dripping down you and you're in a bikini or at least I was so you can feel every drop streaming down your body. this picture i ripped from the internet, but will give you a sense of what the structure looked like...


there are 4 rounds, and in between rounds they open the flap for like 5 minutes. The first round you,.. oh and it's completely dark in there, there is not an ounce of light and you're sitting on the dirt well, they have blankets and it's tight quarters... anyway, round one every individually says what they're grateful for in their life and thanks the great spirit for everything and people talked about thier life and how they came to the sweat lodge and the people who were there with them, etc... I dragged bernsie with me since she went to college with me in boulder and is also a yogi and i thought, if anyone of my friends would do this, it would be her....

then during round 2 you say prayers for people, so like I said out loud that I wanted to pray for my mom who is retiring in sept and for my sister and my friends who are moms of young children, etc etc. And it was getting crazy hot in there, and some people would be like "great Spririt, it's john michael again." so this guy would say his prayer and then like 5 mins later speak up again and say another one for like his agent or some shit (very LA) meanwhile the rest of us were DYING!!! I mean words cannot explain how hot this was, it's called sweat lodge for heavens sake!!

Then the 3rd round was intense. everyone speaks at once and you shout out all the things you want to give away, like anger or bitterness, or depression or selfishness, etc and everyone shouts at the same time and screams and it's pretty awesome and cathartic really, very freeing and you feel a lot lighter! Not just from the 10 pounds of sweat you just lost, but from the act of giving away everything that is holding you back from your potential and all the negative energy weighing you down.

Then they open the flap again and then close it and we have the 4th round and that's when you give away all the good things about yourself and this time we went individually again and guess who kept giving away all the good stuff about himself over and over... you got it, john michael. Bernsie and I were dying laughing on the way home cause that guy just wouldn't shut up. even at the post sweat lodge wrap up he talked twice, i chose not to talk at all,

I'm sure making fun of him defeats the purpose of the entire experience but I woudln't be me if I didn't.

anyway, so what's the point of the sweat lodge? well, a little history here compliments of wikipedia... A general version is that the Creator gave the lodge to the people as a way to directly pray or talk with the Creator. The lodge is often seen as a womb, that gives birth and life, and it provides important teachings to the people. Entering the lodge is a sacred happening that involves important rituals and memories. The lodge provides a cleansing of the body, spirit, heart, and mind. Utmost respect is given to the Creator, the lodge, the fire, the medicines, the animals, the four directions, the elders, the participants, and the ceremonies. Thanks are given for the fire's warmth, the importance of the grandfather rocks, the animals for their skins, and the plants for their medicines. Thanks are given for all the necessary elements of nature that provide us with life and survival.

The lodge is a natural way to bring fire, earth, rocks, water, air, human life, animals, and plants together into one, or close association and contact.

So then at the end we all came out of the lodge and took our towels and laid on them on the deck of this house and cooled off. Also i was staring at all the stars which we dont really have down in LA, i mean you can't see them, but in pasadena you can! that was rad.

then at the post sweat wrap up, they talked about how the guy outside the lodge who heated the rocks saw spirits of coyotes and wolves visiting us! (i swear we were not on drugs, i dont even do drugs...) And then this morning bersie told me she had a dream last night where there was wolf in her dream but my face photoshopped on the wolf! WEIRD.

Okay so i have to say it was a very unique experience, and to get around full circle, I have 2 friends out here, one who I went to high school with and her sister in law, both of whom have only lived out here a few years and they want to go to the sweat lodge with me next time I go, so i was like sure... but during the sweat lodge i was thinking, these girls could not handle it, they're too, new york, and I think all the "i'm so enlightened" stuff would freak them out. Bernsie was Like "it all kinda freaked me out and I'm from colorado!" So what I'm getting at is had I never left NY I would never have experienced so much stuff in my life that has shaped me as a person, yes, some of it has been strange and unpleasant, but the sweat lodge, which I'm not sure I'll ever do again, is an example of the the hippie boulder/california things I love to do and i love about being a westerner.

Bernsie said it best "when I was in there I was thinking this is so california, this is the most california thing I have ever done!"