Solid Garage Classics Feat. Dino & Terry & GI

My my. I do not know where to begin, but I had such a blast at the Solid Garage Classics Feat. Dino & Terry & GI party at Gypsy Co-op last nite.

Thanks to Monique and Yogi, I had an opportunity to join this party, and I had such a fun time dancing with energetic and soulful dancers on the floor.

:)

I am so very thankful that I was there to experience this, because it means so much to me to connect with other passionate dancers and music lovers and be a part of our local deephouse music scene.

Dino & Terry rocked my world and I am still dreaming from the vibe that I experienced from last nite. :) It was also nice to finally exchanged a conversation with them and their crew, Vito and Jonathan. I look forward for the coming Friday catching them again...Nozomi-if you were reading this, you would need to come out with me again :) Also, I would like to extend my sincere appreciation (once again) to Monique and Yogi :) You guys rock!!!!

With much sincere appreciation and respect. :) In love and peace,

Kumi

experiential avoidance and emotional suffering

When I was at a drug store the other day, this topic on the cover of this particular magazine caught my attention: "Is fear limiting your life?"

I am not the one that invests money for magazines, but I had to purchase this magazine to read what was about it, as I have been aware of this personal truth that I live in the fear that to some degree lowers my optimism sometime.

The article mentioned about this lady who developed a fear of flying which led her to avoid not just flying but driving and the whole concept of leaving the house eventually. She became overly fearful about travelling and leaving the house after the 9/11 attack in NYC, and to help her deal with the trauma, she got dependent on the street drugs, and her consumption of the drugs was enough to kill a moose.

Anyway, the article explained to the reader how it is common for us to avoid anything to reduce our emotional suffering level to zero.

"What may be a common behavioural tendency in which I have subconsciously avoided certain situations to not face with the potential emotional suffering and threat?"

I had to clarify my personal experiential avoidance that reduces my potential emotional suffering.

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One of the major hurdles that I have still yet to pass is attending house dance workshops/lessons without feeling humiliated and embarrassed.

I love to dance for many reasons. I feel as though I can manifest what I am feeling when I freely move my body to the rhythm and vibration that I hear and feel. I also feel as though I am dancing with my internal organs, my soul, cerebrating my all senses that let me *feel* such wonderful art of life. And because of my passion to dance, I have once attended this house dance workshop by Brain *footwork* Green in NYC. Although it was for the beginner house dance lesson, all the participants knew what they were doing, and I felt humiliated. Also, when I went to the house dance conference, I became overly conscious of my dance and could not dance in a way I would do so, if I did not feel like the worst dancer on the floor.

I do notice my conscious and naive self not wanting to be the worst dancer on the floor, but from when did dancing become a competitive thing in my book??? Dancing was always my way to manifest whatever I was feeling and return the positive energy to the space as I listen to vibrant music. So why the heck do I care what other people think of my dance etc???

Those were the questions that I gained after my first visit to NYC in 2004. But dancing has become not only a way to manifest myself but to protest my rights to be free. It sounds as though I have turned into an aggressive human if I phrase my meaning/purpose for the dance, but I do not think I can say so in another way around.

I have experienced an incidence that made me feel as though another human being violated me completely. It took a lot of things away from me. My ability to trust my own judgment. My comfort level. My security. My strength. Instantly, I gained self doubt, haunted by fear and nightmares and I was no longer sure if I was permitted to express myself in a way I did to cerebrate my life.

But after sometime living in the dark maze seeking some answers but stuck in unanswered questions, I realized that I can not continue letting my personal experience to limit my opportunity and freedom.

So now I have more deep meanings for all these passions that I have. House music has become a tool to help me manifest my body and soul. I redefined the reason why I ran; Running has become a sport to help me maintain my confidence and strength. Dancing has become a medium to not only manifest myself but to cerebrate my life but to share the joy and blessing of life that is given to us with others, and often as a tool to protest my rights.

So I recognized that my past experience that once made me gain fear and suffering has let me redefine the meaning of certain activities that I was always passionate about. And what I am interested to know is whether I continue let my fear to be embarrassed or humiliated limit my freedom to explore.

I can not completely say that I do not worry about such a thing anymore. In fact, I still recognize my behaviour limiting my opportunities because of my fear. So I want to consciously keep this question within me to reduce experiential avoidance and shape me to continuously engage in activities that I become attracted to/interested in to explore much potential in my life.

to experience the true love is to be in love with the life/world

in the past 1 week or so, i come to unite with two individuals whom I used to exchange mental and philosophical thoughts, ideas and theories with.

one of them is alex, whom i had an online chat exchange the other day for over 3 hours.

during our conversation, we covered some really interesting points and one of them is about true love.

he gave me his theory that to experience the true love, one needs to be in love with the life/world.

i shared my personal experience and fully agreed and supported the theory. Why? Well, no matter how compassionate and loving a person can be, as long as s/he does not have the ability to face and acccept the reality and in love with the world no matter how ugly pictures s/he maybe seeing in the given moment of time, s/he can not experience the true love.

I personally think that the love you give to the world will come back to you in an ultimate and unconditional sense. Meaning that more you give to the world, more you receive. More truthful and genuine love you give, more pure and unconditional love you receive. So unless one has not developed the ability to accept and be in love with this life, the world will not return you the true love one deserves...

I am truly thankful for Alex for sharing his view, because it fully supported something that I have been wondering and thinking about for a while.

I personally have another topic that I want to cover, but I will do so after eating my hot and sour thai noodle soup (my breakfast yes!) :)

Till then, all you have a blessing day. and a happy great new year to you all :)

In love and light, Kumi

self reflection

sometime, i want to stay in my room and just cry.
i have not updated my blog and website for so long.
it is partially because i dedicate most of my time for my work responsibility.
but also because i choose not to reflect my personal thoughts in my web space.

in the beginning of this year, i felt as if someone violated my true emotions that I share on my website. because of that, i shut down my site for a few days, but realized that i should not let someone stop me from being me.

today, somehow my true emotions are acknowledged and accepted by me. no more control over my own feelings.

I guess it is the hurtful feelings that stop me from feeling in a way I truthfully feel. Because I do not want to have negative emotions within me. So my automatic response is to shut them off.
But I guess it does not help me from healing at all.

All of us live with any sort of negative feelings: sadness, anger, upset, irritation, frustration etc.
But I guess as long as one continues to shut such energy off, instead of questioning the origin of such energy, the energy will haunt you back again at a later time, and would become a bigger issue.

But ignorance does not help me from dealing with my own personal truth.

Today, I want to make a commitment to deal with my own negativity by acknowledging and accepting it and questioning the origin of such energy and finding out a way to turn it into positive in my life.

I am glad of my realization tonite. I think I will make some serious notes in the upcoming entries which is a little different from my optimistic and silly past entries, but I really need to reflect on my self right now.

Thank you for the strengh and love. I am blessed with my life. Peace, Kumi

A happy new year!!

Hello-thank you for reading my lame-not so frequently updated blog :(

I have had a bit of down time that I was in a shell spending a lot of my energy to look after myself.

Now that it is 2006 and thanks to my friend, Tomomi's encouragement and inspiration, I have been mentally doing better (stable, and the mild weather has been helping me a lot too), so I have decided to update my blog.

I was going to let my soulmanifesto.net website, as I have been terrible with the update, but I realize that I have given out my email address to some important people that I want to always keep in touch with, so I think I am going to keep it (unless I will change my mind in the last minute).

Well, I have so much to share, but as it is really the time for me to get some sleep, I am going to post some photos for you to enjoy :)

Sending you much positive energy and love on your way. May you have a blessing and fulfilling year in 2006.

In love and light,

Kumi

NYE at my friend's place-alcohol making my face so red in effect: lol



















Doing whtat I enjoy doing so much: dancing! woo hoo! :)



















Jan-1-2006 dinner-sushi party at Kumi's place with friends :)



















more to come...

with immense appreciation for my co-workers

I hate to update my journal when so much time has gone by, but I just wanted to extend my sincere appreciation for my co-workers who gave me thoughtful Christmas gifts and making me feel special :)

I really liked the gifts very much, Jeannie, Lana and Jin :)

With love and respect :)

Kumi

Written later :P

Kumi's sushi @work

Soo it has been way too long since I last updated my page.
i have returned from my succssful business trip to Japan and have spent 1 weekand a bit preparing myself for the holiday season.

i have been starving for the bestest food of Japan, so I bought the finest ingredients that I can find to make sushi one weekend, and here are a few photos of the sushi I made :)














Look how shiny each grain of rice is :)














salmon nigiri :)













smoked salmon and mango pureed mayo sauce with dill













dynamite roll and california roll with real crab meat :)

i brought some sushi (i also made philly roll with cooked tuna steak with philly cream cheese addition to these) for lunch the next day to work and shared some of my food with my co-workers. it seems as though everyone enjoyed it.

I hope to do this again :)