Exploring The Possible … Through the Power of Story

Posted on June 21, 2014 by AlianaAlani

I recently created a Group Page on Facebook called – Exploring the Possible … Through the Power of Story. It has been created to provide a place for people to share their stories and visions of a world of harmony & love, with the idea that in doing so, we and our world can blossom. The article that explains it all is below. You do have to ask to be a member but otherwise it’s an open site, so when you have time, go to the Group Page, take a look and see if it’s for you.

THIS GROUP IS FOR ANYONE TRULY INTERESTED IN ENVISIONING & LIVING IN A WORLD OF HARMONY & LOVE – HERE & NOW

…The group has been started by ALIANA ALANI

THROUGH THE POWER OF STORY…

EVERYTHING IN LIFE IS A STORY. The stories we tell ourselves. The ones we tell each other. The ones we tell our world. Story is how we define the inner and outer of our lives, and it is how we choose to change – from an old story that no longer serves us into a new story of who we want to become.

COLLECTIVELY THESE STORIES become our histories, myths and legends. They waft through the annals of time to a later date where you or I read about them, ponder, and are often enlightened. They are the jewels in the treasure chest of life. They can also be those pesky chains that bind us to the past.

STORY COMES IN MANY FORMS – through the power of imagination and intent, it can take shape via word, sound, and visual – think book, blog, film, video, YouTube, theatre, photography, painting, illustration, speaking, singing, rapping, slam poetry, and of course music.

This is where you and I come in.

THE STORY OF A WORLD OF HARMONY & LOVE:

FOR CENTURIES PEOPLE have spoken of a land of milk and honey; a place resplendent with harmony, love, and abundance. Whether envisioned through the eyes of a poet or storyteller, philosopher, mystic or messiah, it is ever etched within the fabric of the collective mind and heart of we, the people of planet earth.

THIS LAND OF POSSIBILITY has over time been gifted many names. Some call it Shangri-La or Shamballa, some The Land of The Blessed, some Paradise, and many, The Garden of Eden. And though the dynamics within may vary, the essence of all these stories remains the same. In it, we are in tune with our inner spirit, at one with our hearts, in balance with mind and body, and at peace with all in the world which we inhabit. In it, we effortlessly flourish in a magnificent manifestation of the celebration of life. I call this place, The Garden. And in my heart, I know it already exists.

So here’s the opportunity – and I’m hoping you’ll want to come onboard.

WHAT IF WE EACH TAKE THE TIME to envision what The Garden looks like to us? How we feel in it and how we act in it? What if we tell a story about that in whatever form feels right? What if we share that story – here, now?

BY DOING IT, we shine a light on it in our hearts. By sharing it, we shine a light on it in our world.

IMAGINE – your story calling out a song to someone else’s – maybe you’re in North America, maybe they are in India, maybe Bali or Hawaii, Australia or New Zealand, Europe or Asia, Africa or the Middle East – maybe the story sounds similar, maybe even the same. IMAGINE – the power of love in that.

SO WHETHER YOU WRITE a poem, a short story, a song; whether you put something on YouTube and link it here; whether you do a painting or a series of photographs; whether you do an improv session at your school or local theatre and film it for us to see; whether you do it as a group or by yourself – whatever wonderful form you choose to take – take the time to tell us your story, your vision, your dream of a world of harmony and balance, love and prosperity – here and now.

HELP THE VISION GROW. The crazy thing is, if you tell it often enough, you’ll end up living it. Think where we’ll all be then.

JOIN THE VISION – CREATE THE MAGIC – SHINE A LIGHT

…and remember, this is a place for sharing positive loving stories … nothing less will do

ALOHA … and thank you, ALIANA

Listen…

Posted on April 29, 2014 by AlianaAlani

©Aliana Alani 2014

Listen to the winds

Everywhere there is poetry

Everywhere, a story

Your life and mine

The man in the street with a cup and a sign

The story it says of him

The story he has yet to tell

Listen to the winds

Whispers and prayers

Whispers and blessings

Listen

The Gucci bag and the bling tell a tale

But what’s inside tells more

The country, the clan, the lone wolf

All dancing on song lines from yesterday to tomorrow

Beating a drum, a heartbeat, a rhythm

Of passion and promise, sorrow and longing

Desires and dreams

Everywhere there is poetry

Everywhere, a story

Listen to the winds

Listen

To dream …

Posted on December 26, 2013 by AlianaAlani

As we begin to crest the wave of the holiday season and move closer to the end of a year, many of us start, once again, to ponder dreams and desires, both new and old. Forget the resolutions. This is more about the questions that help us sculpt a new world for ourselves. Questions like: what is a our heart’s desire, what do we truly love to do and are we doing it, how would we like to spend each day of the next year of our lives, and for some, with whom? Are we daring to love? And then there’s the larger question – what do we want for our world?

Dreams (and desires) are like stories waiting to be told. Sometimes we dare to look in their direction, feel a flutter in our hearts, and act. Sometimes they filter through the night space rather than the day, hovering.

As I ponder the power such dreams can hold and what waits in those proverbial wings, a wonderful Irish poet comes to mind. Someone whose work I have a fondness for – William Butler Yeats.

Below is a poem in which resides a segment many have come to know. I offer it to you as food for thought. I sense that Yeats would have liked that.

AEDH WISHES FOR THE CLOTHS OF HEAVEN –

BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

Had I the heaven’s embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Posted on November 23, 2013 by AlianaAlani

“The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.”
… Francis Bacon

Me & the writing of BETWEEN WORLDS …

Posted on November 19, 2013 by AlianaAlani

Awhile ago in what is beginning to feel like another life, I wrote a book called, BETWEEN WORLDS. Sculpted from within the mist and memory of Ireland, it tells a tale of a man many later came to call a saint, and a woman remembered, if she was remembered at all, as a sinner. It is an archetypal story. It is also true.

Like many stories locked within the mists of time, it comes laden with baggage and hidden agendas. Agendas, as other writers might tell you, have a nasty habit of not liking their stories to be told. That is, quite obviously, why they have been plopped usually unceremoniously into the depths of that deep dark place sometimes called (at least in Ireland) – the bog.

It is from the bog that they must be retrieved and that, as you may have guessed, is the beginning of what Joseph Campbell would lovingly call – the hero’s journey.

Thus began my quest.

Did I want it? Not consciously. Did I ask for it? Again, not to my immediate awareness. Did I take it on? You betcha.

You see, there was this woman, like an often fleeting apparition, walking around Glendalough – that’s in County Wicklow – think old monastic city, ancient times, power, and yes sometimes light. She was hard to ignore. As was the energy of the place and the sense of whispers and messages slipping forth from the very fabric of the land – the ‘tell the tale – you must you must’ kind. Perhaps you could have walked away from that. Clearly I didn’t.

Frontcoveronly - half size - for internet

I’m mentioning it now because, though I have shared the how-I-got-to-it story to friends, I have very seldom spoken of it to others. The book is not yet well known. It’s self-published, it’s in eBook, it’s on the blog, you have to find it.

I could quite simply let it stay that way. It did after all take many years of my life and I could be forgiven for being tired. But it is a story that begged to be told, and told for a reason most honourable, and I, the storyteller, would be remiss if I didn’t give you a glimpse of why.

… stay tuned please

– book cover by Tannice Goddard – Glendalough photo by Kevin O’Kelly (Ireland)