Kissing the Aquatic Self

Water as lover, water as self, lovingly kissing the essence of life. Being intimate with the creator and steward of life, a prayer, an honoring of the life-blood of all flora and fauna. We are the creation and continuum of the fluid present, thank you water, and thank you life!

Neptune’s Horses

I love this painting by William Crane entitled “Neptune’s Horses”. Like the Greek god Poseidon, Neptune was honored by the Romans as the god of horses as well as freshwater and the sea. The visual of a running line of stampeding horses is very much like the action of waves arriving and breaking on shore. The energy of life in motion. There is a Roman mosaic of Neptune driving a team of horses that have front horse legs and long eel-like tails in the back, so half-horse and half-fish. In terms of myth-making it is a brilliant combination! We live in Ridgway, Colorado, which is horse and ranching country. There are three domesticated wild Mustangs in a pasture adjacent to our property, and two other properties within our view where we watch the social behavior and antics of the horses with binoculars. We like to call it “Horse TV”. Riding waves and ridings horses, Yeehaw!

Summer Water

In my mind and memories, Summer and Water are inextricably linked. When the air is hot and the overhead sun beating down, water is beckoning to cool and refresh the overheated body. This photo is from a very popular summer cool down spot in Arizona. I’ve never been there and I don’t remember the name of the place. I do know that it is super popular and requires a permit to visit. Funny how I feel refreshed just looking at the photo, the summer water memories bubbling to the surface and refreshing my body and soul.

Serving the Community

This is the pool I use for Aquatic Bodywork at the Ouray Hot Springs Pool in Ouray, Colorado. The facility is a true community pool that serves the locals as well as out of town visitors. The pool I use for my work is called the “Hot Pool”. It is usually a bit on the warm side and also a bit shallow for my body to give a session. But on the positive side, the view is absolutely phenomenal! The staff and management are super friendly and very supportive of my work of offering aquatic bodywork to the pool patrons. There are other pools within the facility as well; The Overlook Pool - the thermal springs pools at 104-107 degrees, The Lap Pool - an eight lane 25 meter pool usually 75-80 degrees, The Activity Pool- with climbing wall and floating obstacle course around 70 degrees, and The Shallow Pool- with volleyball net and plenty of safe area for smaller kids to play 2-3’ depth and around 90 degrees. There are two water slides as well, operational in the summer months. The facility is a huge resource for the city and an attractive destination for visitors. It is water-healing and fun for the whole family!

Pure Living Water

Here is a great quote from the Osteopath Pascal De Dene about the importance of water in our living tissue.

“We traditionally use the four basic tissue types: epitheleal, connective, muscular, and nervous to describe the organization of the body. Each of these tissues contains its own specific cells embedded within a distinct extracellular matrix (ECM), precisely tailored to support their function.

What is often overlooked, is beyond these localized ECM’s there exists a larger, more universal matrix - namely the interstitial matrix. This matrix does not merely stretch between between cells, but actually connects all tissues to one another. It is within this space that information, fluids, signaling molecules, cytokines, metabolites, and mechanical forces are transmitted.

It is within the interstitial matrix that “the pure living water” flows. This water is not simply passive, but bound to structures, arranged in layers, and charged with information. As Andrew Still, the father of Osteopathy, proclaimed “the pure living water is the highest known remedy”

Surface Interplay

The surface membrane of a lake or any water at its boundaries is a different form of water entirely. Termed the “fourth phase of water” by science researcher Gerald Pollack, it is more of a stacked liquid crystal form somewhere between bulk water and ice. It acts as an intelligent membrane on a lake surface and in our cells, both excluding unwanted material and transmitting vital information through its liquid crystalline form. Seeing the lake surface membrane respond to falling raindrops is a beautiful, mesmerizing display of this unique form of water, with its array of circular radiating and interacting patterns constantly changing. I always resonate with these surface membrane patters within my own fluid body, like a whispered message from the creator, reminding me to pay attention to what is vital and life-sustaining.

Womb of Creation

We were all created in our mother’s womb, about fourty weeks of formation in that watery environment of embryonic transformation. As adults, most of us have difficult stories of injuries, loss, and trauma, that have impacted us since we were born. We also possess a rich tapestry of pre-verbal somatic stories, feelings, and deep wisdom from our prenatal womb time. By working on ourselves and attempting to more deeply understand the events that have shaped our current self, we migrate back to the difficult, scary, and overwhelming events to renegotiate who we are in the world in order to be happier and healthier. This is the standard template for talk and somatic therapy, to re-work the difficulties and emerge more whole and alive.

Another approach is to realize that everything is happening in the present moment, that the womb of creation is continual, the morphing, growing and developing self of the womb is an ongoing process and in the background of everything we currently do. So the crucible of creation, the heat, the struggle, and the alchemy of transformation is our life-giving essential process and available continuously.

Aquatic Remembrance

Aquatic remembrance is a pre-existent state of mind, one that was present while our brain and body were first developing in the womb. Since it is the original way of being, there is nothing that has to be done to attain this state of mind. The only requirement is to temporarily forget all the learning and training that came afterwards. In Zen Buddhism, this is the basis of what they call “Beginner’s Mind”, unlearning all that clouds pure, in-the-moment perception and being.

Floating

Floating is a primal experience, and we can say it is the earliest and most profound experience of our developing embryonic and fetal body in our mother’s womb. The experience of weightlessness is ecstatic, whether it is induced by water immersion, skiing on light powder snow, or dancing and jumping where the body has moments of suspension. It is this feeling of weightless freedom that we deeply long for and pursue throughout our lives. It is fun, it is playful, and the experience of floating in warm water is deeply healing, returning us to that place of oneness and wholeness.

Fluid Embodiment

“Immersion in water symbolizes a return to the pre-forrmal, a total regeneration, a new birth. For immersion means a dissolution of forms, a re-integration into the formlessness of pre-existence, and emerging from water is a repetition of the act of creation in which form was first expressed.” Mircea Eliade quote

If we pay close attention, we can notice that our life and body is in a continual process of dissolution and reformation, and water is the primary player in this process. I call this “fluid embodiment”.

A Sitting Buddha Gathers Moss

I recently returned from the Amnion 1 class, taught by Mary Seamster and Wendy Hodsen at Mary’s wonderful Amnion Aquatics facility and pool. The location is about one hour north of Portland, Oregon. This area in south-west Washington gets about 65 inches of rain per year and March is a wet month! I was amazed at how much moss was growing everywhere, on trees, rocks, the ground, and decorating the above Buddha and lantern statuary. Coming from the fairly dry, high-desert and mountains of Southwest Colorado, it is a remarkable shift, traveling from a dry desert to a temperate rain forest. This high level of moisture sure does support and encourage moss and plant life.

Convergence

Every moment is a dynamic convergence of many forces. Gravity, buoyancy, cellular movement, breath, sound, vibration, present time, impressions from the past, future longings, the list can be added to endlessly. When someone says ‘be here now” they are actually referring to this continually morphing moment in the unfolding fluid universe.

Suspension

Photographer, Ben Touard

With the balance of buoyancy and gravity, there is a moment of embryonic suspension. A world of its own, between life, death, and re-birth. An immersion in liquid space, a formless dance with the fluid universe. This is the abode of dissolution and creation, fused into an endless instant.

Structures of Water

The structures of water are endlessly creative! The photo above is from the gallery collection of Ben Thouard, the French surf and water photographer working in Teahupoo, Tahiti. The underside of big surf waves is a myriad of crazy water structures, vortexes, tubular flows, bubbly aeration, and under surface illumination. “Vicinal water” is a term that describes the different and more crystalline structured water found on the edges or membranes of these flows. It is a state of water that is structured and stacked more like ice but able to morph and flow. There is a great book describing the attributes of this type of water by Gerald Pollack called “The Fourth Phase Of Water”.

Let water be your guide

If you are wondering where to go, let water be your guide! This is the essence of the “way of water”. Acknowledging water as a higher power, a creator of life, a sustainer of life, and a powerful agent of transformation. The above image was taken at Playa Sonabia in Northwest Spain. It is such a magical and dynamic beach, craggy mountains in the background, open rolling meadows with cows grazing, and a large tidal flux on the beach that has about a quarter mile of sand at low tide and mere feet at high tide. There are a lot of weathered and softened volcanic rocks on the edges of the beach that are sculpturally striking in appearance. There are little tidal pools next to some of the racks that create perfect places to play in the water. When we rented an Airbnb place in Sonabia, which is a very small village a short walk from the beach, I played in the water and danced on the sand multiple times per day. So invigorating and renewing!

Valentine’s Water Love

It was a snowy 2025 Valentine’s Day in Ouray, Colorado! Just outside the Ouray Hot Springs Pool that I visit daily for my workout and water fix, I saw this young woman, lovingly and patiently creating a Valentine’s snow sculpture. She was just starting the snow person when I went to the gym and over two hours later was putting the finishing touches on the big snow heart and the little snow heart. She lives in Alaska near Anchorage and is a ski racer and coach, but also very interested in snow and ice sculpture. She is in Ouray for an extended stay to climb at the Ouray Ice Park. She was very enthusiastic about how much she loves Ouray and mentioned if she ever leaves Alaska, she will move to Ouray. There are so many ways to love and create with water!

Telling a Story of Water

Water has continually written my life story! From my watery beginnings floating in the womb, to my very first word uttered, “arsh” which I pronounced as the sound of water emerging from my parents kitchen faucet The above photograph shows the icicles hanging from a red sandstone cliff on a bend ofHighway 550, traveling south from our home nearing Ouray, Colorado, which is home to the Ice Climbing Park and you can see why. Almost every day I make the drive to go soak and swim in the Ouray Hot Springs Pool. I admit it, I am a water addict, a true “Aquaholic”. Water and stone, I love you!

Water and Stone

Water and gravity are the masterful writers and stone is the recording tablet for all events of life on earth. When you look at this photograph that I took on the edge of the Gunnison River near Dominguez Canyon, it tells an ancient story, which can be investigated like a detective in a crime scene. If I were to file a report, I would say; “A geologically recent boulder rolled off the sandstone cliff above, probably loosened by water and freezing temperatures. With the assistance of the unseen hand of gravity, it rolled down the embankment and landed on top of the older Pre-Cambrian Granite which was sculpted by the river water flow.“ The time-scene is a revelatory moment, uncovering the history of geologic events which occurred millions of years ago, and the immediate moment, the watery dance of the river, a gentle breeze caressing the grass, and the shape-shifting clouds drifting high above the canyon walls. Welcome to the ancient present!

Water is the Master Stone Carver

I traveled to the Escalante River near Delta on a fairly warm day in late December to scout for possible places to do cold dips in the river. I had read that during run-off season the river is too high to be entered safely, but thought in the dead of Winter, the water should be fairly placid. I went to a place about twelve miles along a dirt road that mostly follows the Escalante River called Potholes Recreation Area and Campground. It is a short walk to a cliff area that gives a great view of the river below. The rock in the lower area and around the river is all a type of hard precambrian granite and over many years of erosion created by the action of water there are some amazing pools! I took a cold dip in two places after finding a way to descend the canyon cliffs to get next to the river. There was nobody else around, just me and the very alive, cold water stream.

Frozen Bubble

This is so cool, a bubble blown in freezing temperatures and then photographed. I will try to make some.