Give me that 10$ back!

11 years ago, I came from NYC to California to rest after a brutal divorce. I thought, why not work in a kitchen, not think about anything for a while, and add my skills to a team? After working as a computer programmer and systems analyst in Manhattan in the 90s, after intense study and teaching yoga in the early 2000s, after 10,000+ hours of classical meditation and a complete expansion of the mind, after building a medical business with my ex-husband, why not wash dishes and fry corn cakes? Especially in a high-energy environment like Esalen’s old kitchen! So I went for it. For a year I "renounced the world", lived in Esalen and worked in a kitchen. I value new experiences and don’t classify them in the usual way. Every experience here, while alive, is an opportunity to learn more about myself. Still learning and still interested These days, many of those lessons come through conversations with other people. I never get tired of watching someone suddenly relax after seeing their situation from a different angle. And sometimes we even laugh together at our predicament here.

Something beautiful happened these last two market days. Several people said something to me that I wasn't expecting. "I'm so grateful you exist." "Thank you for being here." "I'm grateful I can just come and talk to you." It touched me ❤️ Today, three women sat down with me. Each conversation lasted longer than usual. They needed it. They all found their way to my purple tent differently. One has been reading my Facebook posts. Another was sent by someone who had already sat with me. The third had seen me at the market many times but had never had the chance to stop. What struck me how effortless the whole day felt. Not because I suddenly figured something out. The effort had already happened. It was in showing up every week, sitting in the purple tent, writing, listening, and simply being available. And people just walked over. As I listened to these women, I realized they weren't thanking me for a service. They were grateful that if life became confusing, they knew there was a place they could simply come, sit down, and talk. That realization touched me more than I expected. I never set out to create something like this. I simply wanted to be available. Looking back, I think that's what has been growing all along. Not just a little purple tent, but a place where people know they can come when life gets tangled. ❤️

Yesterday I had the feeling that I had crossed some invisible threshold. Not that I had arrived somewhere, but something had changed. For the past few weeks, I noticed that I mostly worked with people who came to the market specifically to talk to me. I realized that recognition had happened. People no longer stumble into my Purple Tent while shopping for vegetables. They come looking for me. Someone tells a friend. Someone remembers seeing my posts. Someone says, "You should talk to Elena." And I thought that perhaps life unfolds much like a tree. At first, roots spread wide. They search. They explore. They reach in many directions. Recognition comes. Connections are formed. The web expands. And then, something else begins to happen. Roots grow deep. A mature tree does not need to spread endlessly. It needs nourishment. And nourishment comes through roots going deep. There are seasons in life when we are meant to spread wide. And there are seasons when we are meant to deepen. Not more people, but better fit. Not more access, but more trust. Not quantity. Depth. And this part is the most interesting: Trees do not control their roots. Roots grow where nourishment and gravity invite them. Perhaps wisdom is recognizing the season we are in and allowing the roots to do what roots have always done. Spread. And spread some more. Until one day, without consulting us, they begin to go deep. In their own time.

Empathy says "I feel your pain." Compassion says: "I know your pain." Empathy can be overwhelming. It can rush to fix. It can panic. It can act emotionally. It can even become confused and carry burdens that do not belong to it. Compassion is quieter. It recognizes suffering because it has known suffering. But because it knows, It does not assume that love means immediate action. Compassion can sit beside pain without becoming lost in it. It can allow people their own experiences. It can trust life enough not to interfere with every discomfort. Perhaps that is why compassion feels so peaceful. Not because it cares less. But because it understands more. And because it understands more, it no longer needs to act on every emotion that passes through. Sometimes love acts. And sometimes love simply knows. 💜

Most of us carry a wound. Not necessarily some dramatic trauma, but a painful sense that something is wrong with us, that we are not quite okay as we are. Sometimes it appears as anxiety, loneliness, tension, or a vague dissatisfaction that follows us through life. And naturally, we look for relief. Some drink. Some use substances. Some work endlessly. Some distract themselves with entertainment, relationships, or constant activity. Or we build a personality of authority and hide in there. Anything that allows us, even temporarily, not to feel the pain. Eventually many discover that these remedies do not last. And so some of us turn toward spirituality. Perhaps we have already exhausted other options. We realize that temporary bandages will never bring lasting peace. We are willing to go all the way. We are ready to transcend suffering itself ! But here we encounter a great disillusionment: Transcendent experiences do not heal the wound. Years of spiritual practice do not heal the wound. Even the most profound enlightenment experiences do not heal the wound. In fact, as many sincere seekers discover, the pain may become even more intense. The structures and defenses that once protected us begin to fall away, and what we spent our lives avoiding may stand before us more naked than ever. So what is it that we are really seeking? The ability to simply be ourselves without tension. Peace of mind. Contentment. Who worries about enlightenment when they are deeply content? Who thinks about transcendence when there is simple peace? Perhaps what keeps us in perpetual suffering is not the wound itself. It is the endless effort to avoid feeling it. And healing begins not when the wound disappears, but when we stop running. What we have always wanted was never some extraordinary state. We simply wanted permission to be here. Exactly as we are. Without tension. Without inner war. Without having to become somebody else.  Without hiding our beautiful, vulnerable self.

One of my neighbors at the Carmel Valley farmers market is Peter, 79 year old woodworker who makes black and white photography framed in raw wood. There is something about his work I really enjoy. The subtlety of black and white. The texture of unfinished wood. Nothing flashy. Nothing trying too hard to impress anyone. Every Sunday he quietly arrives at the market with his photographs and wooden frames. He could easily stay home at his age, but instead he keeps showing up. I noticed something about him recently. Peter never rushes. Not physically. Not psychologically. In a world where everybody is optimizing, accelerating and reacting to constant stimulation, there is something deeply human about an old craftsman simply continuing to show up with pieces of wood, black and white photographs, and his quiet presence. This photo somehow captures two humans showing up every Sunday with our strange offerings in the middle of the Hay Universe . Peter looks like a man who quietly sanded wood for 60 years and made peace with reality. I look like a festival piñata that escaped containment in a parking lot

When I first learned reading runes, I was guided in my dream to a teacher in Russia, a Mage. I am deeply grateful for that period, he gave me the initial insight and understanding in rune interpretations I needed. My relationship with the runes never became static. It wasn't a matter of memorizing meanings and applying them forever. It continues to evolve. I notice patterns. The runes notice how I see those patterns. Meaning emerges through the relationship itself. This is not something anyone taught me. There is a living participation taking place. At some point, my teacher and I naturally went our separate ways, because I could no longer allow someone else's insights to override my own direct experience. Many traditions speak about this moment in different ways. In Buddhism there is a famous saying: "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." , because eventually one must stop following someone else's realization and walk one's own path. Mastery, to me, is not the perfect repetition of what we have learned from others. That may produce skill. But art begins when something more immediate appears. When there is direct communication with Reality itself. Then the art becomes alive. And perhaps the learning never really ends. It simply becomes a conversation.

People sometimes assume that market sessions are "little sessions" and private consultations are the "real thing" or somehow deeper. I don't see it that way. The difference isn't depth. At the market, sessions are focused mostly on one inquiry. We look at the runes first. Then I ask questions, people answer, and together we interpret the runes and bring clarity to what is happening. There is not much unnecessary wandering. The process itself is very concentrated. Life becomes clearer, and then I move on to the next person. The tent belongs to more than one human being. Private sessions are different, but not because they are deeper. There is simply more space. More room for people to tell their story. More room for tears and connections. Sometimes people need to tell their stories, even if this is not necessary for interpreting the runes. Sometimes people have multiple inquiries. Different parts of their lives need attention. We move from one area of life to another as the conversation unfolds naturally, allowing each part to receive the attention it needs. In the market, the session serves the flow of humanity. In private, the session serves the spaciousness of humanity. Neither one is a lesser version of the other. They are simply different environments. And perhaps this is why I never saw the markets as a way to lead people somewhere else. The purple tent was never meant to be a doorway to a "next level." It is already whole in itself. Private consultations are not an upgrade. They simply provide a different kind of room for what people may need.

There is a Russian saying: “Я прошла огонь, воду и медные трубы. ”Literally:
“I went through fire, water and brass pipes. It sounds strange and dramatic :)
Fire and water I understand. But why brass pipes? Fire is suffering.
Water is instability and life itself.
But brass pipes are glory, praise, self-importance, ego inflation. Sometimes the brass pipes are harder to survive than the fire. Pain can humble people.
Success can intoxicate them. This is why Russian sayings sound like someone survived:
war, heartbreak, revolution, betrayal, spiritual crisis and three symbolic deaths 😄 Meanwhile Americans say:
“I’ve been around the block.” Russians go through fire, water and brass pipes.
Americans just stroll around the block :). But both probably point to the same thing:
life eventually educates everyone.