It’s been 2 weeks since I wrote to you. And I cannot seem to grasp what can happen in only two weeks. We have exited the jungle few days ago and since then I have been making space to slowly come back to connection and have time to rest & digest. As I am writing this, I am on the beautiful deck of my dear friend’s house in Costa Rica, where I will be spending next few days to take a breath before I go back south, this time to Colombia. 

I feel incredibly blessed to leave the jungle only to go to another version of it - where the green is still everywhere around me, where people get up with the sunrise, and life stops to watch the sunset, where I can continue to walk barefoot, hear the birds, cicadas and monkeys, soaking up the sun and enjoy her majesty the ocean. What a beautiful, soft landing this is after the experience I just had. 

It takes a while to get to the jungle. We have got to the outskirts of it close to the city of Baños. The life around us became more vivid, the colours became brighter and the sounds of birds and crickets, the ones of the rivers and the rain are already singing the most beautiful songs. 

As you are reading this I am (hopefully) already in LLanchamacocha, with the Sapara tribe of our dear friend Manari Ushigua,  and we have all made it together. 

The thing is - when you go to the jungle you stop having control - you are reminded that you are dependent of the forces greater than you. So even though we think we are flying in at the specific time, we actually don’t know - it is the weather that needs to allow it, and sometimes we need to wait for the rain to stop so that the plane can take-off. When? Nobody knows. 

I have arrived in Quito early morning. As soon as the plane has opened the door, I could smell the warmth of the asphalt we landed on. I could see green all around me. I could see a simple airport that reminded me of how things used to be in Croatia. I often miss those simple buildings without all the plexiglass and steel, cold fake glamour as I sometimes call it. 

So here I was, on the other side of the world, stepping on the ground that I know with the enormous joy and gratitude to be there, as well as my introduction to the land, saying hello and a prayer to Pachamama of Ecuador to welcome me. 

Xavier waited for me with a big smile a plate with my name on it, and took me to our ride. I wasn’t allowed to carry any of my luggage with him, and appreciated so much the masculine welcoming me in this way.

What a life. 

If you live in Croatia, you get used to needing to take 3 flights to get to South America. This time the gods of Skyscanner were kind showing me there is an option of an overnight flight from London. I was so excited to see it. Not only that I would break down my journey,  spend 11 hours in a small box up in the air at the time of my usual sleep, but I get to go to my other home, UK, and have a moment with my dear sister before I take off. 
I find it really interesting how life brings certain people together at the time around great changes or great adventures. That has been the case for me and Mira for many years. Going places or coming back changed, having a moment in between together - in between destinations, new cycles, projects, dreams coming into being - having a moment to sit down, share a meal, share stories and visions, questions and worries, having a moment to dance, oh boy, I appreciate that Spirit’s unfolding more than I can describe. 

Even though I have been travelling to other continents on many occasions, this time getting ready to go was more difficult than ever. 

I am aware as I am writing these words that most of the thoughts and feelings I’ve been having the last few days belong to the realm of first world problems. I am also aware that I'm incredibly blessed to be going back to the Jungle. And at the same time, I am also aware that the older I am, the more beauty I experience in my life, and the more sadness I witness in this world, I understand more and more how precious life is - how incredibly strong, but incredibly fragile it is, and how it can all be changed in the matter of seconds. 

So this time I left home with tears in my eyes. Dropping my dog off a week ago at the most beautiful dog care with my family, seeing my mom, her man, spending time in the days that followed with my close friends and my incredible family, bringing this winter break to the end and gathering all that I need, so that a day before I could start packing. 

Crying for a vision – that is what this prayer was originally called. I find myself at home, listening to the birds mixed with the sounds of traffic, feeling my system trying to find a way to be with it all, not to forget, to keep alive, to breathe through the concrete instead of dirt beneath my feet, to see the leaves in my mind instead of flashy billboards, to hear the songs of the constant prayer instead of conversations that happen just so it could happen, to be with my heart, body, mind and soul in connection with the land, with the lands, people, ways, and prayer I have just been a part of at the same time finding ways to expand and love it all.

Vision quest is one of the oldest prayers, passed on through generations and generations in different ways in many places of the world. It is an offering we can give to Spirit, to ourselves and to our communities, being four days and four nights in our circle, surrounded by our own prayers –our prayer ties, surrounded by nature, under the sun and the moon and the stars, becoming part of nature in the most original way and focused on the prayer for the vision for our life.

It’s been exactly a week since incredible time in Zadar and going deeper with the cold immersion practice once again.

And why once again? It is because I have found a practice that challenges me and has an incredible effect on so many levels. And when I say it challenges me, I don't mean the fear of cold or of the bath itself - I have a deep respect towards it, but no fear. What I do have in mind is that this practice, as many of the ones I do, allows my deep unconscious parts that I cannot access in my everyday life to come to the surface, and with it does it with incredible speed and deep strength. 

God I love my job.

I love (these) people. Love the music love the beat.

Love the hidden underneath.

Love the road as much as the sky, wish to live before I die.

Love the sense of air on my lips, the salt and the sea on my hips, my fingertips, on my skin and in my hair.

Love the pleasure more than pain, love on earth comes with restrain, the ways we keep ourselves away, fearing fear and what else may

Be coming in this world, being human all the way

Angers, fears, resentments, grief

even though our life’s too brief

I drove to the seaside the other day to hold a dance session at the beautiful Mosor Observatory. That’s a peak event of my summer dance sessions, a ceremony I started as a tradition, an evening that means so much to me and opens the Earth and the Sky for me and the dancers to take us deep into the dance of our lives.

I could just show the beautiful videos, photos, the amazing space we created and the time we shared last night. But that wouldn’t be even the half of it. The journey to get there is what counts. The journey to get there is the medicine of what I do.

I started my travel the day before thinking I was fine. I said I was fine. I thought I was fine. And ‘fine’ was on the surface and somewhere deep in my core.

In between there was something else.

On my way to the seaside I’ve bumped my car, scratched the bottom of it breaking the plastic that protects the engine. If I only knew it was a metaphor. And clearly ‘fine’ is not what I was.

Nakon desetljeća rada s traumom i kao tjelesno-orijentirana psihoterapeutkinja, nakon gotovo 15 godina u tom polju prvo kao klijentica, učenica, a potom kao praktičarka, učiteljica, stručnjakinja, s velikom zahvalnošću za put koji sam prošla i s osjećajem završetka želim podijelitida sam odlučila prestati raditi s traumom i individualnim radom kao psihoterapeutkinja.

Kako je ovo promjena dolazila s vremenom, mnogi od vas neće biti iznenađeni.

After a decade of working with trauma as body-oriented psychotherapist, around 15 years in that field first as a client, student, later on as practitioner, teacher and professional, with deep gratitude for the road traveled and the sense of completion I would like to share

I have decided to stop working with trauma and 1:1 sessions as a psychotherapist.

As this change has been coming over time, many of you will not be surprised.

Do you know how hard it is for a man to get on the dance floor? To show up, be there, to do the work and show themselves in the strength of their vulnerability? If you’re a man, you probably do.

If I were to step in a room full of (just) men, not only would I think twice, but I truly cannot guarantee how comfortable would I feel exploring the depths of my psyche, my heart, body and soul over and over again week after week as an only or one of few women there. I dare to say that I love and trust both myself and men in general that I could do that. Yet again, I, as a woman am rarely in that situation in any kind of self-development context, psychotherapy or conscious dance.

I was thinking to re-publish an old text yesterday about my father leaving this Earth. As much as I love that text and as much as those feelings and learnings are very much alive within me, this year it is clear how this day became a deep celebration for me.

As many have shared, this time of year is about the connection, awareness, conscious recognition and acknowledgement of the ones that walked before us. It is about recognising that torch of light that we have received and choosing what do do with it. It is about remembering, daring to open up the heart, feel the love and pain of missing loved ones and strengthening that channel in between the worlds.

Self-employed - when you love what you do, make it your vocation, have a lot of freedom, dedication, often passion, when you’re crazy and courageous enough to go for it, put in the hours, and hours, and hours and keep on growing and evolving whatever is that what you do.

I often hear ‘woow, how great it is that you can do all that, travel, have days off when you choose to…’ - they are right, that is absolutely awesome. And that is absolutely something that I show much more than what’s behind the scenes - not because I don’t value it, but because Egremni beach in Greece is far better photo than schedule of my next events and emails with the organizers.

There are moments in life I can be at two places at the same time. Those juicy, alive, vibrating magical moments when there is all and nothing at the same time, here and there, feeling it all at once, being taken to the sky by the magnitude of the emotion rushing through my veins, insights and imprints, embodied presence, being more than I (think I) am, dissolved to the space around me…

And there are those other moments too, when it feels like I’m nowhere, when the contraction kicks in, focus is lost, meaning becomes just a word and all becomes nothing once again. Funny this life is, huh?

Birthdays have always been special for me. It’s the time of looking back, looking forward, readjusting, recalibrating, sensing who I’m becoming, where I am, where to next and what’s the point anyway.

I have often thought I was not from this world - from the place I was born, from the community, rituals, culture, mindsets and patterns. I have often cursed to be born where I am, to feel the pain of wars deep in the land itself, to hear the songs that carry the history of separation, to see the landmarks and statues of what I see as humiliation, not victory and to smell the lust for revenge deep in our collective national and trans-national unconsciousness.

I have often cried because of my people and even more often I have cried with them and for them. And I have found myself over and over again to keep on trying to find the connection to this nation that resembles the one I have to incredible living earth, the land and nature within these borders.With years I have learned where to look, how to walk, when to speak up&down to walk without being bothered. With years I have also given up on that, knowing that (our) discomfort is growing pain.

I am blessed to say that I have traveled. I have seen much of the beauty of this world and I am privileged to say I have experienced this Earth. I ran on the beaches of South Africa, woke up with the sun over and over again on the majestic Croatian coast and dived among the fish in Adriatic sea.

I have listen to the silence of desert in Algeria, disappeared in the starry sky in the mountains of Peru, I have swam in the icy river Dart early in the morning before anyone is awake, inhaled the air of Nevada, felt the sand underneath of my feet in Greece, felt the cold winter breeze on my skin on top of the Alps and tasted the snowflakes melting in me.

And I have been changed by the jungle of the Amazon forever.

It took me years to start laughing. First it was because it seemed to me there were no reasons for it. Later it was because I was spending a lot of time digesting my past and challenging times in it. Just to set the record straight right, I’m not saying there were no reasons to smile in my past. There sure were. What I am saying is that for a long time I could not feel it, express it nor live it.

It really does feel like a lifetime ago.

It wasn’t until a moment in my dance training at the School of Movement Medicine that I became aware of it. We had a practice where we danced in front of the camera and later on we watched it with the whole group. I remember seeing myself, witnessing that young 23-year-old woman in her dance and feeling so much for her.

The first time my drum landed in my hands tears started strolling down my cheeks. It wasn’t from sadness, but from melting of the part of my heart I did not even know I was missing. To hear the beat of the drum, to hear the heart beat, the heart call, the deeper current of where I need to go, who I need to be and become, how I need to show up in this world, what I have to give and receive… to hear the beat of Life, to dance to it, with it and for it…the drum has been my friend along the way for many years. As if we have never been without each other. One of those strong meetings that you know it will be with you no matter where you go… so once again we are stepping into a ceremony. Once again tonight we drum. We drum for ourself, for our loved ones, for all Life on this Earth. We drum for passion, action, for dedication, for whole lotta love and for the magic of this world. Feel free to tune in with us…

It’s been 5 years since I entered the Amazonian jungle with my dear teachers @shamanyaacov Yaacov and Susannah Darling Khan and with amazing people who will become my friends. I had a plan to go back this year. Life had other plans obviously. Still, I feel I can visit it even from where I am.

The journey into the jungle is a life changing experience. It resets our whole being in a way I did not know was possible. It is one of those experiences you do not forget, but keep on dreaming with the jungle, with the Forest life, with the Heart of the World for as long as you live and breathe. It is one of those experiences you wish everybody has and wish to share it with the world around you.

Entering the jungle is nothing like you planned. Just the opposite, it teaches you that you are not in control what so ever.