West Meets East©

By Caroline Patrick BorNei

Certified Red Ribbon Professional of the International Feng Shui Guild

My Life Up to This Point, Part 2

Continuing my personal journey from last week’s column, the story continues about the struggles and joy we all experience in some way in finding our way to liberation and a hopefully happy ending! I had just been attack by a “friend” in my own college classroom. I smiled and mumbled something about how each of us should be able to express their own ideas about life, and she informed me I could get fired if I decided to do that! “The college pays you to teach us, not hear your ideas on life and energy.” Yikes! So to recap, please read on...

That is a day I will never forget. It changed my Chi or personal vital energy, and in turn changed my life. When someone or something demands us to fit their idea of whom we are, we die a little bit each time we allow this to happen. The talents God gave us are squelched. We sometimes never recover. I finished the class with a smile that fateful day and drove the 10 miles home to our desert farm. To release the anger and injustice of my friend chastising me in front of the whole class, I screamed out the open car window at every cloud, mountain and road runner bird that crossed my path! Then I cried all night at the injustice in the world, and tried to figure out the difference in who was a friend and who was an acquaintance. It would take years to figure out the karma of it all, but it was training for my new life. I continued to teach, lecture, laugh, cry and shape-up to society’s code of obedience in a state-run facility. Deep down I knew my destiny was connected to speaking my truths, but I hadn’t yet formulated what those truths might be.

The current problem at the college was, they didn’t know what to do with the new popular art teacher that actually demonstrated at every class, answered all questions, took time to help every student, and filled all her classes to the max, until they had to extend her days from 2 to 4. The current art teachers were enraged that I was “taking” all their students. My boss and his boss spent hours arguing over the dilemma, but in the end, money talks. Over 65 students a week were on my roster. We had fun, they continued to enroll year after year, and continued to create 10 to 14 paintings a semester, depending if they were in a beginning or advanced class, with some driving over 50 miles one way. The old teachers were only getting students who needed to collect another few credits and completed 3 paintings per semester. The desert is vast, and learning to paint the wild compelling sunsets, silver tumble weed, cacti and desert creatures was stirring their interest and producing some really good artists. We had festivals, shows and the little town in the desert now had a very active art league. The land was their classroom and over the miles, they were assigned to watch the sky, the clouds, mountain colors, time of day, lights and shadows, coyotes and quail, fences, windmills, dry washes, wind, rain and floods. We drilled though their experiences and added color combinations attempting to capture nature’s bidding.

The desert college had two separate campus facilities, one in Douglas and the other in Sierra Vista. I taught mainly at the Douglas facility and the vast outlying areas such as Willcox and Sunsites. Some assignments took me as far away as Kearny, Arizona Central and Pima. I taught locally and privately until my classes expanded to 12 per week. The college gave us buses for field trips to outlying areas. It was an exciting life, one I had never envisioned.

As my classes expanded once again to the north of Tucson, I was asked to teach with grant money given by the Reagan administration. I accepted because I loved a challenge and adventure. Driving across the reservations during the long hours of commuting gave me plenty of time to think. The roads and freeways were quite empty in those days, and to keep awake, I ate popcorn and Tootsie Pops. It was a two-Tootsie Pop trip between Willcox and Tucson, or about one and a half hours, and a four-Tootsie Pop drive to Kearny. My Spanish-speaking students rolled in laughter at my attempt to use my three-year high school language skills, and I learned quickly that text book words and everyday Spanish are two different animals! I invariably muttered something relating to a body part instead of the color to place on the palette. Some days I was more of an entertainer than their teacher. It was my job to teach painting four days a week for each semester.

At this time a friend begin to send me newspaper articles about an ancient art called Feng Shui. She lived in the San Francisco Bay Area! (Continued next week)

Caroline Patrick Bor Nei is a certified Feng Shui Practitioner and a Red Ribbon Professional of The International Feng Shui Guild. Her abilities as a consultant and artist are widely known in the US and abroad. Caroline has completed over 5000 consultations for individuals, large and small businesses. Return clients appreciate the value of her suggestions both mundane and transcendental, providing support on multiple levels. As a college art instructor for many years, Caroline understands the power of color, its symbolism and the visual effect images have on individuals and their surroundings. Her home base is Portland, OR where she continues to write, teach, paint, do illustrations and give herbal medicine making classes. She is available for Feng Shui consultations; Feng Shui art consultant, advises builders, architects and mentors a few serious students.

Call (503) 208-2960 or email caroline@fengshuiartistry.com.

Any suggestions given in this column are only for entertainment. Please contact your physician for any medical or herbal advice or diagnosis. Caroline Patrick is not responsible for any misuse of her advice or suggestions.

Caroline’s “West Meets East” weekly newspaper column, can be read from an archives on her website www.fengshuiartistry.com