Everyday Ecstasy » beauty

Meet my Manatee Buddies! Swimming with wild Manatees is cool!

Joe Noonan — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 14:27:31 +0000

I was working on the computer, got a ‘hunch’ to go to the beach…

Cool! Maybe its the manta ray! Maybe I’ll be able to free her up this time! I grab my dive knife and camera, just in case… (there’s no way I’m going to miss showing you the cutting of her fishing lines!)

I grab a dry towel, put on my swimsuit, then the phone rings and I get sidetracked…

The hunch comes back, “Get to the beach now!” Grabbing my still-drying wetsuit off the clothesline, I race for the car and hit the gas…

There’s several places I park… which one? What the heck, I head for the south lot…

Unloading my gear, I start talking with a group of divers who’ve just gotten out of the water (The ocean looks awesome!) Suddenly one of them points toward the water, “What’s that?”

My neck snaps into position… every sense on alert, I scan, excitement building… Is it the manta ray? Am I finally going to be able to free her of the fishing line?

A dark black blob, eighty feet from shore, moving slowly south… Manatees!

I’m off in a flash… running down the beach to get ahead of them, carrying my dive flag and buoy, heart pounding…

I’m five years old… singleminded… totally excited, racing for the sheer fun of it!

A few hundred yards and I stop, panting… I unravel my floatline, tie it to my gear, wade into the water (brrrr!), put on my mask and fins and kick away from shore… I want to get into position far enough ahead of them so my heart rate is calmed down by the time they arrive…

(If you cannot see the video, click here)

I used to lead manatee trips… its been a few years, but I’m re-inspired after today! If you’re interested in finding out more info, join the email list at www.PlanetaryPartners.com

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Upcoming – Christmas in Bimini! Dec 22 – 26, Swimming with Wild Dolphins & Activating our Joy!

Joe Noonan, Founder
Planetary Partners
An author, speaker, life coach and spiritual guide, Joe leads leadership retreats around the world and facilitates self awareness programs for those on the path of awakening.
A guest on National Geographic, Fox TV and Oprah, Joe reflects back to people that this world is already a Heaven on Earth, and that the tools to find joy in the moment are around and within us. That harmony is inevitable and that innately we all just love each other and sometimes we forget — he is here to help us remember.

Wild Dolphin Trips – http://PlanetaryPartners.com/Dolphins…
Everyday Ecstasy Blog – http://AJoyfulNature.com
Self Awareness Programs – http://PlanetaryPartners.com
Corporate Leadership Seminars – http://QuantumLeadershipProject.com
Joe & Jen’s Adventures – http://TheWideAwakening.com
Join Joe on Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/pages/Joe-Noo…

Join our email list for upcoming dolphin trips, workshops and other events – http://PlanetaryPartners.com
Planetary Partners advocates, educates and celebrates conscious co-creation on an individual, local and global level. We offer workshops, meditations, events and trips that awaken our divine connection with Nature.
Download our free radio shows and seminars at http://PlanetaryPartners.com
Join our 5 day trips Swimming with Wild Dolphins in Hawaii & in Bimini, the Bahamas, http://PlanetaryPartners.com/dolphins…

“Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God” Tielhard de Chardin

Swimming alongside a Hawaiian Sea Turtle

Joe Noonan — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 17:08:13 +0000

Nature, in all her forms, radiates such a powerful current of joy, peace and beauty…

Sometimes, it amazes me that we aren’t all fully enlightened and awake, her current is so strong…

I just finished this video at 3 am this morning, and listening to it now, with the addition to Snatam Kaur’s angelic voice, has me in tears…

We are so infinitely loved and blessed…

(If you cannot see the video, click here)

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Join Joe’s Planetary Partners email newsletter for upcoming dolphin trips, workshops and other events – http://PlanetaryPartners.com
PLANETARY PARTNERS advocates, educates and celebrates conscious co-creation on an individual, local and global level. We offer workshops, meditations, events and trips that awaken our divine connection with Nature.
Download our free radio shows and seminars at http://PlanetaryPartners.com
Join our 5 day trips swimming with Wild Dolphins in HAWAII and in BIMINI, the Bahamas, http://PlanetaryPartners.com/dolphins…

Joe Noonan, Founder
PLANETARY PARTNERS
An author, speaker, life coach and spiritual guide, Joe Noonan leads leadership retreats around the world and facilitates self awareness programs for those on the path of awakening.
A guest on National Geographic, Fox TV and Oprah, Joe reflects back to people that this world is already a Heaven on Earth, and that the tools to find joy in the moment are around and within us. That harmony is inevitable and that innately we all just love each other and sometimes we forget — he is here to help us remember.

“Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God” Tielhard de Chardin

No manta ray yesterday, but I did make friends with a turtle!

Joe Noonan — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 19:39:03 +0000

I’ve been going out into the ocean every day since I met the manta ray… I’ve sharpened my knife to cut her free from the fishing line, brought a pair of pliers to snip the fishhook on her brow…

No luck… I’m following every intuition, and feel like this is an unfolding in some awakening way. I’ve learned so much already; that the manta and I are one, that her skittishness is my skittishness, that she doesn’t need to be freed of the line, that everything’s ok, and its ok for me to want to remove the fishing line from her!

Yesterday, I surrendered that I was going to find her; I have to let grace coordinate the meeting… once I surrendered, the beauty returned…

I saw a nurse shark in a coral head, an eel out foraging, schools of surgeon fish and ballyhoo… then I met a sea turtle and, just as I did with the manta, I followed him…

As I relaxed and got into a ‘vibe’ with him, I dove down beside him… we swam side by side, it was magical!

The music, ‘Azure Salver’, is by Snatam Kaur.

(If you cannot see the video, click here)

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Join our email list for upcoming events – http://PlanetaryPartners.com -
PLANETARY PARTNERS advocates, educates and celebrates conscious co-creation on an individual, local and global level. We offer workshops, meditations, events and trips that awaken our divine connection with Nature.
Download our free radio shows and seminars at http://PlanetaryPartners.com
Join our 5 day trips swimming with Wild Dolphins in HAWAII and in BIMINI, the Bahamas, http://PlanetaryPartners.com/dolphins…

“Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God” Tielhard de Chardin

Ocean of Abundance! A Florida Beach ReUnion!

Joe Noonan — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 06:49:57 +0000

After a month away, I flew back to Florida today.

I left the vibrant cool colors of autumn and my sweetie pie back in Toronto at 4 am… I’m about to go on the road for a few weeks; Boston, Santa Fe, San Diego then Texas, and in anticipation, my body and spirit have been CRAVING an ocean immersion fix!

I arrive in long pants, sox, sneakers, shirt and sweater. The sweater comes off in the terminal, the shoes and sox come off at the curb while waiting for my ‘brother from another mother’, Jeff, to pick me up. Soon as I’m back in my humble studio, the shirt comes off, the A/C goes on and the jeans are ditched for shorts. Ahhhhhhh…

Two hours later, I’m peddling my bike to the ocean…

Its only a mile, the lone hill between me and the shore is the bridge over the intercoastal waterway. This is the first body of water I cross, then I weave thru 4 lanes on A1A, then a left turn down a quiet side street…

One block, two blocks, then thru the palm trees, I see her; shimmering turquoise blue and my heart leaps…

I pull up to the park, lock my bike against the tall slender trunk of a palm tree that I love (she’s fed me coconuts), grab my fins off the back of my bike and head for the water just steps away…

I walk across the beach, warm sand between my happy toes as my eyes scan the horizon, drinking in the vast liquid expanse, feeling my own spirit expanding out to match her…

Close in, there’s two people wading in waist deep water… Beyond them, a yellow kayaker, beyond that, a red kayak with a dive flag… He’s at the outside edge of the first reef, next to a favorite spot of mine… (I hope he leaves some lobster for me!), further out, another dive flag (he’s on the second reef), and then two more boats past that. I smile, drinking it all in as I come closer to the water’s edge, our reunion steps away…

Suddenly, just past the two people, a silver and blue Bonita tuna, about 2 feet in length, leaps out of the water, making an arch like a rainbow, colors flashing in the afternoon sun… WOW!

He hits the water and it explodes! About 8 silver, yellow and blue jacks launch themselves in every direction in response. What vitality! What abundance! Had I looked a moment earlier or later I’d have never seen it… how abundant, how blessed…

I come to the edge, toes in the salty sea, and say a prayer of thanksgiving… My love for the ocean has become reverence, entering her is an act of grace… slowly I wade in, inviting her completely inside me, appreciation of her pouring forth effortlessly… I swim out to the buoy and back, freediving and rolling on the sandy bottom, reveling in the 82 degree water. Wahoo!

I see the trail of a couple of sand dollars; I dive down, turning them over in my hand, setting them gently back down… Its good to be back, I love this place…

Slowly I swim my way to shallower water, the early evening sun angling in yellow… A flash of movement beside me, I flinch, the shadow flinches in response… Its a school of mullet, about fifty of them. They flee, my startled response too much for their edgy defenses…

Caught by the grace of their pod fluidity, I follow… Not too fast, (it’ll scare them further), just enough to slowly close the gap between us.

I send them love, waves of love, from me to them, from me and the ocean, from life to life… They slow, circle around, the biggest fish in the school swims over close, looking me in the eye… I swim alongside the school, they move closer…

Suddenly we are together, an odd coupling of sentient beings, united in mutual appreciation. My eyes are on them, admiring the beauty of their movements, every single one of their 50+ eyes are on me… I am a hunter, they are prey, but I’m not hunting now, and we mutually agree to leave that story behind us and bask in the flow of mutual love and respect.

The three biggest mullets keep swimming closer, I cannot help but think about how tasty they are! I smile, they know the difference when I’m without spear and appetite! We look deeply into each other’s eyes, recognizing that we are different only in outer form…

We swim together, as above, so below… the waves choreograph our shallow water dance, picking us up and splashing us down in unison…

I’m getting cold and the sun is setting, reluctantly I swim for shore. The shallower I get, the warmer the water gets… What’s the hurry, I ask myself, the increased warmth relaxing my shivering muscles. I tarry, floating in 2 feet of water, watching the play of sun and waves on the undulating carpet of rippling sand beneath me…

The sandy ridges move and shake with each incoming wave, the sculptor’s hand never idle… each undulation creates another flash of symmetry human hands only dream of…

Something brushes my leg and I almost LEAP out of the water! Skin rippling, I turn…

Two tiny Palmetto, oval-shaped silver sided fish with coal black fins, scurry between my legs… I kick up some sand; they dart in to inspect, looking for tiny morsels of food. I watch, enchanted, their silver sides flashing in the light…

One of them brushes up against me again… My body tingles from so gentle a touch… he swims around and under my leg, rubbing his silver side against me again and again… a flood of ripples race thru me in ecstatic reply…

Amazed and delighted, I let my legs rest on the sandy bottom as my torso rocks in the waves. Again he undulates his body against the skin of my bare legs, moving up my thigh… I pull the open cut of my shorts close, afraid he might swim right into them! The other one joins in; like two kittens rubbing up to say hi!

I sit on the bottom, putting my torso underwater. Like a pair of dancers, together they swim up to the center of my chest, at heart level, fluttering against me, one going clockwise, the other going counter… I’m in total amazement as they each do a complete circle around me, touching.. me.. all.. the.. way.. around…

Overwhelmed by a flood of love and sensation, my mind stops.

I know these are not just ‘fish’; these are loving entities, embracing me such that a burst of joy floods out of me and into the water like a bolt of lightning…

They bob and weave, rub-a-dub dubbing up against and around my legs… I can almost hear them purring, or is it me… Its so ecstatic, I’m goofy, almost dizzy… maybe its the waves, I lie to myself, rocking in awe of the magic of their touch…

If people only knew, knew the beauty and the joy and the magic, so readily available, right here, with a mask and snorkel, with some time to slow down and simply be immersed…

The idea of doing winter family retreats on this beach returns… its a lot of work, my mind retorts, I’m already doing too many different things. The kids will love it, the ocean replies… Some people will take advantage of it, spoil the whole thing, my mind fires back… You’ll be facilitating a powerful deepening, a reunion of spirit and earth, the elements whisper…

I’ve had this dream before; organizing weeklong retreats for families right here along this very water’s edge, during the winter months when the icy winds blow up north. Give those who seek a natural connection a way to dive deeper; immerse themselves in the churning January seas… It looks like fun, yet a lot of work too, find myself tensing from the thought…

I’m reminded that I need not leave the water, I can facilitate the deepening from here, by my own deepening, my own deepening vibrating thru all of the oneness, awakening, remembering the depth and intimacy of this embrace…

Write about it, they say, share the wonder we so joyfully share with you… as I am, now, thru these words, so YOU may remember the beauty of her grace… I know you know, (you’ve swum and dove and read this far with me…), I know you feel the same movement, the same remembering, the same awakening of the divine feminine, of the oceans of life, within you as well…

Wahoo!

Joe

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‘YES LOVE CAN’ Conference, Nov 20th, Ohio

‘NEW YEARS RETREAT‘ Hawaii, Dec 29 – Jan 3rd, 2011

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JOE NOONAN is an author, speaker, life coach and spiritual guide. He leads leadership retreats around the world and facilitates self awareness programs for those on the path of awakening.

A guest on National Geographic, Fox TV and Oprah, Joe reflects back to people that this world is already a Heaven on Earth, and that the tools to find joy in the moment are around and within us.

Following are some of his programs:

Custom Wild Dolphin Trips!

Self Awakening Seminars

Creating Conscious Corporations

Joe & Jen at The Wide Awakening

Joe’s videos on YouTube
Joe’s blog ‘Everyday Ecstasy’

Amazing Sunset left me breathless…

Joe Noonan — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 05:13:28 +0000

Beauty has a way of reaching inside of us…

I was out on the water, the sky was incredible…

Took a video while the beauty took my breath away…

Check it out!

(If you cannot see the video, click here)

SHOW ME THE BEAUTY! A fastrack to Awakening…

Joe Noonan — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:31:25 +0000

(If you cannot see the video, click here)

I love beauty, it brings me back to the present moment so easily… I can be stressed, uptight and anxious, and a moment of beauty slides into my awareness and BAM…. my body relaxes, stress disappears, wellbeing fills me and I remember that all is well…

The other day I went for a walk… I got about three blocks and started saying my daily mantras; Thank you body, thank you earth… and beauty caught me…

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Cat got my tongue…

Joe Noonan — Mon, 10 May 2010 13:19:44 +0000

I haven’t been posting regularly and as I lay in bed this morning contemplating why, this I heard…

“What’s the matter, the cat got your tongue?”

Its an age- old question, usually from an adult to a youngster.

How many times as a kid did I stand there, looking down, not knowing how (or wanting to) put into words something that, once expressed, would cause shame or ridicule. It was typically over one of two things.

I was caught doing something I’d get in trouble for, or…

I’d witnessed something beautiful, and either didn’t have the words to express it… or I was ashamed that, when I attempted to put into words the incredible magic of what I’d beheld, I’d be ridiculed…

This is exactly why I’ve been mute… I’ve been afraid to put into words the incredibleness of my experience, afraid to feel the rejection of my youth, a rejection we all have felt when we attempted to share the magicalness and beauty of life to grownups that had forgotten, or never even knew.

Writing this, I’m healing a split within myself, between my left logical brain and my right intuitive brain. I’m telling the five-year-old in me that its ok to speak of the magic of life.

I also know that, if the words are true and real, if I let them fly off my tongue of their own passion and excitement and vitality, then they will be alive, they will be a kind of ‘Harry Potter’ spell, and this spell will lift the veils from our eyes so that we once again behold the absolute beauty, magic and wonder of our world…

Disappeared in the ocean…

Joe Noonan — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 19:30:02 +0000

Wow, its been two weeks since I posted anything…

My apologies! I’ve a commitment to sharing beauty with you. There’s something magical that happens when I talk or write or video about what I love… it starts as an instant replay, (which is in itself pretty cool) then it goes from reliving a memory to actually being there, actually living it…

I get to live it again as I share with you…

I spent two weeks in Bimini, the Bahamas, with my sweetie Jen and The Greenbergs and the Benedicts and the ocean and dolphins and hammerheads and a sailfish… THAT’S why I haven’t written…. I, like Jonah, was swallowed whole…

And, like Will Ferrell in “Land of the Lost”, I came out the other end intact! (and smelling quie a bit rosier)

The photos and videos will follow… in the interim, I love and appreciate being on this adventure with you!

Namaste!

Joe

29: Appreciate the Ones you Love!

Joe Noonan — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 22:15:34 +0000

(If you cannot see the video, click here)

Appreciation ROCKS!!!

I’m totally serious here… it totally does! It shifts your energy in an instant!

You are surrounded by people you love… why not let them know it??? (you don’t even have to say the ‘L’ word!)

Everyday Ecstasy gets a new name (and a new home!)

Joe Noonan — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:11:38 +0000

Things are really taking flight over here in my slice of the world… I’m renaming this blog and giving it it’s own website.

I love the name Everyday Ecstasy, it captures in a nutshell what I live and love; the ecstasy of everyday life. So why change it?

Because ecstasy is too big/foreign/imposing a word for many people. Some don’t know how to spell it (including myself at first).

I searched for an easier, friendlier, more inviting name, and I love ‘A Joyful Nature’. Its even a bit of a pun! (Outdoor Nature and Human Nature)

Its being switched over tomorrow, and if all goes as planned, you won’t notice a thing. If we have to ask you to resubscribe, I apologize! Once we get it settled in the next day or two, we’ll be off and running (and playing and posting and celebrating!)

The mission and vision is still the same; Celebrating our Love of Life! Thank you for your participation and your comments!

A handful of amazing color!

I’m making some new videos for YouTube, one of them will be a slideshow of these autumn colors! More beauty and color coming your way…

PS: Click on the photo to see the rest of the photos on picasa